Defiant Cashman returns, vowing change
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A feisty, defiant Brian Cashman said today that he returned to the Yankees to “change the story” about where the team was headed. “We have to win,” he said. “And we will.”
Oddly, Hal Steinbrenner was not on hand to give the family’s side of the story. But Cashman said that relations between he and the Steinbrenners have improved since last winter when some moves were made he did not approve of. He also believes that they can work together moving forward.
Obviously he did not address the future of specific players, especially those FAs from outside the organization. But he warned fans against expecting the Yankees to get certain players. That means CC Sabathia.
He did say he wants Matsui to DH, Damon to play the outfield, Posada to catch and a first baseman to play first base.
Back with more later. But here is the full audio from his press conference:
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Chad Jennings
Sam Borden
He did say he wants Matsui to DH, Damon to play the outfield, Posada to catch and a first baseman to play first base.
Does that mean Giambi will definitely be gone?
Time to get down to business
“Does that mean Giambi will definitely be gone?”
Certainly hope so.
This organization isn’t going to pay for past success, especially when it comes to arms…you are buying a used car, other people’s problems, no reliability.
Cashman has heard the criticsm of his handling of pitching, most of which were FA signings and most of which were terrible.
He’s not going to let that happen again. This organization will continue to develop young arms and be leaders, not followers, when it comes to pitching.
“He did say he wants Matsui to DH, Damon to play the outfield, Posada to catch and a first baseman to play first base.”
Total genius right there.. That’s why hes the CashMan!
Ed -
Cashman didn’t get into too many specifics, but he did talk strongly about getting younger and improving their defense. I think a reasonable person could infer that Giambi won’t be re-signed. Or Abreu for that matter. But we’ll have to wait and see for sure.
Nice to see Cashman realize he has to win and confident that we will.
Welcome change from the silly ‘rebuilding year’ propaganda from last year.
I think Giambi has to go…he’s a relic from the All-Star at every position mentality that dominanted after the 2001 WS loss.
Cashman is trying to put his own imprint on this team…Giambi is not part of that plan.
If Peavy is available for Hughes, Kennedy, Melky or something , then Hughes is as good as gone.
As long as we don’t include Cano or A-Jax along with Hughes, it’s fine.
Cashman would make a good politician.
And I say that in the most loving, caring way possible.
***
Why does Vrsce think I’m not supposed to surface until the evening?
I think this offseason could work out a lot differently than anyone speculating here. With money to play with, clear needs and a desire to not overpay, it is by far the most interesting off-season for the Yankees since 2003 or maybe even 1995. For a guy in Cash’s position, he must be relising the opportunity to work this offseason, I just hope he isn’t afraid to get creative.
Glad to see Cash is back and knows he has to win.
That said, we need to sign another “ace”-type pitcher to help carry the load.
Stick will have larger input
One thing that’s important to keep in mind: Even with Brian Cashman coming back as Yankee GM, Gene Michael figures to have a bigger say this winter on player personnel decisions. And Michael, as we all know, loves those high on-base percentage guys. (For the record, Holliday had a .405 on-base percentage away from Coors Field in ‘08.)
http://www.nydailynews.com/spo.....tml?page=0
“That’s the big take away lesson from this year with Hughes, Kennedy and Chamberlain.
The pitching wasn’t why they missed the playoffs but regardless that move didn’t work out.”
cb-
i really like the analysis and info you put into your posts, but you have to give it up that the plan to turn over 50% of the starts to hughes , kennedy, and joba was not a major blunder #1 and #2 that it did not knock the yankees out of the playoffs.
because it was a major blunder, and it did knock the yankees out of the playoffs. 7 wins by someone in hughes’ and kennedy’s starts would have pushed them over. how hard would that have been. any journeyman league average pitcher could have done that.
the disruption caused by jerking joba all over the place and ultimately disabling him pulled the rug emotionally from the team. i won’t even go too far in saying “i told you so” concerning i didn’t like how joba was transitioned into the rotation”. i took a lot of flak for that. well how did that rushing him into the rotation work out?
the whole plan was inherently flawed from the beginning. it is what took the yankees down.
i’m asking a serious question in asking what has changed with cashman that he won’t fail the next test he takes in planning a season?
because he did fail with his 2008 plan.
But Cashman said that relations between he and the Steinbrenners have improved since last winter when some moves were made he did not approve of.
What could those have been…re-signing Posada? Letting Torre walk away?
Interesting comments…
Good to see he and Joe are on the same page.
Enough of these Jorge, Matsui and Damon playing first post.
A reliable season from Cano might also have brought those 6 or 7 wins needed to make the playoffs.
RE: Gene Michael loving high OBP guys….that is why Teixeira is a major target this off-season, plus he’s a switch hitter and it will only cost money to get him, not young players.
re-post, from the last thread:
SJ44
October 1st, 2008 at 12:45 pm
Cano, Veras, Kennedy and Hughes for Peavy and Adrian Gonzalez.
Padres get two young arms to plug into their rotation, a power arm for their ‘pen, a very good, young position player at a reasonable salary and the ability to move Kouzmanoff to first and Headley back to his original position of third base.
Yankees then sign Hudson as a FA for second base.
They get a top of the rotation starter, all star first baseman (with a great glove) and a very solid second baseman.
The cost of all this is less than one year of CC Sabathia and still puts the Yankees in position to do more in the free agent market.
Just throwing it out there.
I think getting rid of Torre was all at the hands of Randy Levine & the H&H boys, so I can imagine that Cash did not agree with that move.
I’d trade Hughes for Peavy. However, it’s not happening
1. Hughes won’t be enough. You don’t the Sox would swoop in and offer Buchholz, Bowden, and Lowrie or something? Not to mention teams who need pitching that are loaded with prospects like Atlanta, Texas, Milwaukee, Colorado, etc. will offer much better packages
2. Peavy has a NTC and has known to be a big proponent of going to the south. I doubt he would approve a trade to NY. That complicates things too.
Peavy will be a Brave.
Doreen -
I’m glad Cashman is finally going with the idea of “getting younger”. Whatever he has plans for, I’m sure it would be a good one. Cashman should try looking into trading for Ryan Garko for 1B.
Jonothan,
How about signing A-rod to a whopper of a deal after Cashman said that they wouldn’t sign Alex as a FA if he opted out?
“Scorpio
October 1st, 2008 at 12:58 pm
I think getting rid of Torre was all at the hands of Randy Levine & the H&H boys, so I can imagine that Cash did not agree with that move.”
don’t know about that.
If we could expand the trade to Adrian Gonzalez, then by all means they can have Hughes and Cano+.
Cashman’s plan is a long-term plan…success is not determined on a season-to-season basis.
And you don’t give up on it after one ‘failure’ of a season.
Again, the Red Sox in ‘06, no playoffs, next year WS champs, thanks in large part to the contributions from pitchers they didn’t trade after not making the playoffs.
Cashman doesnt want to sign sabathia, WHY. where are you going to find the same production, where? You are not going to. They need to make at least a good offer to him
I would prefer Joba as a starter, but whatever the Yankees do, I am in agreement that they need to decide before Spring Training.
I think it’d be a tremendous waste of his talent not to start, but that’s not the point.
Mel — RE: A. Rod…I suppose, but even Cashman would have to listen if A. Rod came crawling back…you can’t just dismiss a player like A. Rod because of pride. Maybe Cashman would’ve handled it differently and maybe A. Rod wouldn’t have walked away with as much money, but I still think he would’ve been back.
RE: A. Gonzalez to the Yankees…Why would a team with no offfense and no prospects trade their only offensive player?
vinny,
I don’t know either, but I recall Torre saying that ONLY Cashman was on his side.
“But Cashman said that relations between he and the Steinbrenners have improved since last winter when some moves were made he did not approve of.”
I listened to the whole press conference and I missed that.
Torre on WFAN now.
Torre on with Fatcesa on WFAN is anyone is interested in listening
“Cano, Veras, Kennedy and Hughes for Peavy and Adrian Gonzalez.”
Not that it could happen but I’m 100000000% behind that.
Cashman doesnt want to sign sabathia, WHY. where are you going to find the same production, where? You are not going to. They need to make at least a good offer to him
Because he sees the 500 innings CC has on his arm over the past 2 seasons.
Because he sees that CC did most of his stellar work after moving to the NL.
Because he sees that CC died in the playoffs last year and had a slow start in the AL this year.
These are all red flags…and a GM that got killed for the past 4 seasons for signing Carl Pavano is not going to take that risk.
They will make an offer, but they won’t be serious about it.
Like my friends at the fantasy 411 say…CC is YPNM
I don’t care if the name is Matt Holliday or Adrian Gonzalez, they can not deal Robi Cano that type of deal wouldn’t make any sense. Also Cash has to rethink that catcher situation and OF Damon I could understand a bit but Posada after surgery I don’t see that panning out. What I don’t want to see is bad FA spending ex. Teix for 10 yrs., Manny for 4…IT’S NOT NEEDED, Matsui has trade value he has to think about that as for FA spending one name CC Sabathia he is a need and needs to be priority #1.
“I listened to the whole press conference and I missed that.”
It was in an answer to Sweeney’s question early on.
Jonathan,
Make no mistake, there will be modifications of “the plan” in the off-season.
Every young player given prominent roles (Cano, Cabrera, Hughes and Kennedy) on the team bombed.
Believe me, if Cash did nothing this off-season, and stuck to his plan, he would have a hard time seeing out the remaining part of his contract.
They will be real aggressive this off-season.
I’m not saying they will do dumb stuff.
They won’t trade Phil Hughes for a 33 year old OF/DH.
However, if they can get a guy like Peavy, or someone of that elk, Hughes is going to be on the table.
Miss the playoffs one year? They can live with that. If its the start of a downward trend, he, and Girardi for that matter, will see their support with ownership dry up faster than snow flakes on a sunny day.
“But he warned fans against expecting the Yankees to get certain players. That means CC Sabathia.”
I think the intention here was to manage the expectations that people think CC will definitely come here. He essentially said that CC will have to make the decision no matter what the Yankees offer to come to NY.
Cano, Veras, Kennedy and Hughes for Peavy and Adrian Gonzalez
They’d never do that. Kennedy, Hughes, Cano = Adrian Gonzalez and I still wouldn’t do that. Too many people are letting this one season w/ Robi Cano dictate his future, he’s had one bad year, one.
Rebecca
Rosh Hashanah
Although I could be wrong on this, as in so many other matters.
I suspect Cashman was willng to hold the line on the contracts given to Posada and Rivera. No doubt he was willing to let ARod walk and spend all that money on two players, maybe three.
That said it sounds like he is not in a rush to get back itno the post-season if it gets in the way of becoming younger and better defensively. To me that means FA in their mid-30s need not apply. Hell AJ may be “too old” in that mindset.
It also means FA in their prime, under age 30 will be targeted… so we’re back to Teixeria (a real 1B) and CC. I think his comment is meant to lower expectations that the Yankees just wave their magic checkbook and get any and all FA they want.
Can’t imagine the Padres trading Gonzales either. I’m strongly opposed to trading Hughes, but if he is the key to getting Peavy or another # 1 or # 2 starter I guess I’d bite the bullett. Holliday is a fine hitter, but sure doesn’t make the defense any better.
“i’m asking a serious question in asking what has changed with cashman that he won’t fail the next test he takes in planning a season?”
randy,
As usual you bring up a number of very good points.
In terms of why the team didn’t make the playoffs I can only tell say what I think the evidence shows. And the evidence is pretty overwhelming that the offense was the predominate reason why the team underperformed. 150 runs short of a reasonable projection is mind boggling bad.
That’s not to say that the offense was the only reason. I do think it was the major reason.
But you are absolutely correct in that relying on Hughes, Chamberlain and Kennedy proved to be a major mistake. It was definitely a contributor as to why they didn’t make the playoffs.
This might be wrong, but the way I usually look at most decisions is based on risk and probability. I thought relying on the three young arms last year was very risky but worth the gamble. It completely blew up. There’s no way around it.
IMO it was a unlikely that things went so unbelievably badly for all three. 2 our of 3 ok. All three with so few innings pitched/ wins?
But during the season there was another major surprise that mitigated the effect of the three young pitchers being terrible. The bull pen was absolutely fantastic. It really was. And going in to last spring who was going to be in the bull pen and what they’re role would be was completely up in the air.
And it was the low likelihood of the bull pen being so good that off set the low likelihood of all the three young pitcher being such disappointments. That seems to have evened out the pitching along with Mussina’s surprise performance.
The pitching in 2008 was a little better overall than the pitching in 2007. So to me that seems like a wash. A big disappointment – but a wash.
There’s no doubt Kennedy/Hughes cost them games. But so did losing Wang. Everything is tied together obviously on a staff and its depth so clearly Kennedy/Hughes made it even more difficult to tolerate Wang’s loss.
But on the whole it seems like the pitching’s downside was leveled out by the surprises on the upside.
Again that’s not to say that relying on Hughes/ Kennedy wasn’t a mistake as it clearly proved to be. But I do think that mistake was not the major reason for why the team was a disappointment.
Where I think you have a much better case is this. Relying on Hughes/ Kennedy/ Chamberlain so much did make it virtually impossible for the team to win the world series this year.
That is to say even if the offense would have been good enough to get the team into the playoffs their current pitching staff would have given them no chance to win in the playoffs.
So IMO the offense was the main reason why they didn’t make the playoffs. But relying on Hughes/ Kennedy/ Chamberalin so much gave the team almost no hope to win the WS even if they had made the playoffs. Don’t know if that makes sense. But I think their failure is more specifically related to squelching the likelihood of a WS.
Jonathan,
They won a World Series because they spent 100 million dollars on Dice-K, another 70 million on Drew, and another 25 million on Lugo, on top of keeping certain guys.
Can’t leave out that 200 million bucks they sunk into the team.
They also had younger position players, such as Ellsbury, Pedroia and Youkilis about to take key roles within the team.
The Yankees lack such young position players and their calibur of returning starting pitchers is on the light side.
Its why that while they will keep most of their younger talent, some will go this off-season to improve the team.
Let both Hughes & Cano go? The shortsightedness of some fans is astounding. I think I’m going to be a Minnesota Twins fan next year, you know, they actually let their players develop.
We will see…
There will be slight modifications to the plan, but it will not be blown up and started from scratch…the early pieces of the plan are on the cusp of ML ready…to just ditch them now is bad baseball.
And after all he’s invested in Hughes, I find it hard to imagine Hughes being included in any deal that is not a blow your socks off deal.
Brandon –
I don’t want you to have an early heart attack but you got to see what Bill Madden planned for the 2009 Yankees:
Bill Madden’s 2009 Yankees (must have adobe reader to view it)
Does it look like a World Series bound team to you?
Hughes for David DeJesus and Zach Greinke
Kill 2 birds with one stove
If the Yankees are going to be working with Cano during the off season then he is staying. Why would they invest the time and effort in order to trade him away? So another team could get the benefits of him getting back on track? Yeah, that would be brilliant. Absolutely brilliant.
Hughes playing in the fall will give Cashman and other teams a chance to see what he can do. While it isn’t definitive, it helps more than him not playing. That will dictate what the Yankees plans will be for him over the next season.
Cashman doesn’t show his hand if he can help it. If he plays it cool there is better chance for him make moves and not over pay.
“Let both Hughes & Cano go? The shortsightedness of some fans is astounding. I think I’m going to be a Minnesota Twins fan next year, you know, they actually let their players develop.”
That would be the plan of a professional sports writer, Bill Madden – (which I agree is idiotic) – but don’t label everyone based on the comments of one idiot writer.
This press conference by Cashman is getting me more pumped up than Rocky 4.
I’m really intrigued by Lowe if we don’t get Sabathia.
That would be a very smart signing, I wouldn’t be shocked if the Sox snatch him up from under us though.
I DONT CARE WHO YOU GET. NExt Year u gotta at least make it to the ALCS
With CC, its a double edged sword.
EVERYBODY knows the Yankees want CC Sabathia. That’s not exactly a secret.
The part that is in doubt is, just how much does CC want to play in NY? If they have to go 7 years for him, they aren’t going to do it. Nor should they.
I think its tough to bite the bullet on 6 years for him, given the workload he is under right now.
Unlike earlier in the decade, when they backloaded a lot of deals with free agents, I think they will be frontloading deals this year.
Lower years, high AAV.
Will players go for it? Depends on what other offers are out there for them and where they will be comfortable playing.
Its not a question of whether or not Cashman will make a play for Sabathia. He will. Its a matter of whether or not Sabathia wants to play in NY. That’s the big issue.
“But he warned fans against expecting the Yankees to get certain players. That means CC Sabathia.”
I hope we narrowly miss out on landing CC so next season we can have 2 pitchers to lament about.
Pete, thanks for posting the audio so quickly. It was a good listen.
-Defiant-Did he bang his fist?
-”There’s a lot of people who live and die with this Franchise everyday”
-Cashman was being nice. He wanted to say “get a real first baseman to play first base.”
-Interesting comments about the offense tightening up. If they had just done what they usually do, we wouldn’t have lost a lot of those games where we gave up 3 runs or less.
-Cashman really wanted to answer the how do you evaluate pitching talent better question with, “You know, it’s a total crapshoot”.
-People on the way out the door without a ring: Giambi, Moose, and Abreu.
-Yes, Cashman. Please put down the lame horses. Who knows more about horses? Brian or Hank?
-One thing is clear, he took a few shots at the media. WTG!
Cashman on WFAN now
And the Yankees will do the same…Teixeira, another FA pitcher…others I’m not even thinking about.
But what they did not do is go to the pool of great young arms and start trading them.
They didn’t abandon the plan and it paid off in ‘07 and even more in ‘08.
Cashman on with Francesa.
i have no prob with that SJ44 move for Peavy and Gonzo, but i dont see the Padres throwing in Gonzo… he costs less per season for the next couple seasons than Cano does, right?
I see Peavy in pinstripes, though. call it a gut feeling.
Peavy and Teixeira.
use Hughes and Kennedy, plus a couple moving parts, just for Peavy.
use Cano for another young starting pitcher.
sign Hudson to play 2nd.
“Hughes for David DeJesus and Zach Greinke
Kill 2 birds with one stove”
You are not gonna get both Dejesus and Greinke
Cashman has become so feisty this year
- Telling everyone to calm down about Hughes and not overrate his AAA numbers
- Appologizing to the media for Girardi lying to them
- Standing up to Hank all year when he started a brush fire
- Today’s press conference
I love it
Yes, trading Hughes and Cano for 2 all star players, both of whom are under 32, would a an “awful” thing.
How have the Twins done the last 12 years, “developing their own players”?
You “develop your own players” for the opportunity to improve your major league team. Sometimes, that’s through trades. Other times, its by keeping those players and integrating them into the lineup.
I’m not looking to give Cano and Hughes away. However, and realize this is just discussion points, if I have the opportunity to acquire guys like Gonzalez and Peavy for them, they are gone if I’m the GM.
Brian Cashman doesn’t have the window from ownership or the fan base, as Bill Smith has in Minnesota, to “have a good year”. He has to win.
How to get there is the discussion.
Cashman getting feisty with Fatcessa too!!
Didn’t you mean Jimmy Gobble? Although you might need an oven for that one.
Oops, didn’t realize it was a Bill Madden quote, I thought a Lohud poster had written that suggestion in. My apologies…ahh, I do not need to change team allegiance just yet.
Everyone should stop overrating the prospects and listen to SJ. He knows what he is talking about. Hughes is NOT untouchable for Peavy and if the deal expands to Gonzalez, then all bets are off, no combination is untouchable (except Joba of course).
Unbelieveable how Fatboy is so ridiculously out of line talking to Cashman.
Ed, Bill Madden has yet to prove to me he knows anything about putting a baseball winner on the field.
I still don’t get why people are so anxious to give up on Phil. I’m not directing this to those that don’t like him. SJ, I know you like Phil a lot, but the kid was the #1 pitching prospect in baseball. He’s got a ton of ability and the makeup to go with it. Why all of a sudden is he someone you would easily deal just because Brackman is waiting? I don’t care how talented he is – he’s not close to the majors and trading Phil because you think Brackman MAY be really good (which will be several years down the line at least) is not a good idea, IMO. I just find it funny that it’s always Phil who’s name comes up, which make me feel like everyone wants to dump him (despite the fact we’ve already seen substantial promise from him). I admit that I am a huge Hughes fan and even the talk of dealing him pains me…even for a Peavy.
There is no way Hughes gets traded, the way Cashman gets fired up when people start critizing him (Hughes)…
He has too much invested in his decision to stick with Hughes…
Go Cash!
“Let both Hughes & Cano go? The shortsightedness of some fans is astounding. I think I’m going to be a Minnesota Twins fan next year, you know, they actually let their players develop.”
And that fine organization rewards its fans with what, 2 WS championships in 40± years? Have fun.
Fatcesa can shove it
CASHMAN~
Call up the Kc GM and make him a offer
Kennedy and melky for dejesus if thats not gonna get it done
put in edwar
Francesa dumb as usual. Hughes and Kennedy aren’t the reason they missed the playoffs. The pitching was good enough to still win.
Ed, Bill Madden has yet to prove to me he knows anything about putting a baseball winner on the field.
lol, very true Brandon. What do you think of trading for Ryan Garko to play 1B if the bid for Texieiera have gotten overhand?
Good lord fatcesa-open your eyes! It took a miracle for this team to score 1 run and that was what killed us
Hughes’ name always comes up is because he is our only trade chip along with Cano. We have no young position players at all, so Cano is obviously more untouchable. Both are available for the right deal. Joba is obviously untouchable for anyone.
Nobody is giving us the Peavys, Kemps, Fielders, and Hollidays of the world for Austin Jackson, Melancon, or Romine.
CASH: Joba and Wang in the rotation next year. Joba is a starter. Please let this be the end of it.
I’m actually glad Francessa is being tough with Cashman… it allows us to get to the bottom line of his line of thinking. Always good to know his ideology and see if his opinions have changed.
I love the way Cashman tempers the over-the-top Yankee fan. I have nothing but respect for the guy. I will always maintain that he knows baseball and the market a lot better than Yankee fans do.
So everyone needs to start realizing that the teams you have put together may not be the teams that make it to Yankee Stadium.
Anyway, I did not read (haven’t heard the audio yet) that he said Abreu is not coming back, so I wouldn’t be too quick to make that assumption – or any assumption for that matter. Let if flow kids, let it flow. Much better for your blood pressure, and face it – nobody here has any control over who will come and who will go!
He told you who he does want to see back. Sorry for all of you who had trades made for Sui and Damon!
As always, I’m amped. To borrow a line from ancient Chinese philosophy, free of expectations, I am free from disappointment.
GO YANKEES!
GO ANGELS!!!
“One thing is clear, he took a few shots at the media. WTG!”
Now that will be worth my listen!
I’m glad I’m not listening – Fatso has a love thing going on with Minaya and he treats Cash like yesterday’s trash. LOL I still remember the time that Cash hung up on Fatso and Fruit Loops….What if El Blimpo getting on Cash about now?
SJ
Why would you want Jake Peavy when most Padres’ fans believe he chokes in the “big stage” i.e the playoffs?
What is your belief on this statement? Do you think he would handle the NY big stage?
CF up for discussion
“Nobody is giving us the Peavys, Kemps, Fielder, and Hollidays of the world for Austin Jackson, Melancon, or Romine”
Don’t be too sure of yourself.
Would Kennedy and Melky land me Garko I doubt it, it depends who goes, I’d love Laporta or Garko but that would depend on what we have to give up.
I hope Fatboy doesn’t preech Nate McClouth anyone who has seen him everyday knows he’s not a CF.
Nobody is talking about trading Hughes for Joe Blanton.
If you can get a Peacy for him.. a young ace who is locked up at dirt cheap for the next few years for him, you absolutely do it. There is no declining velocity, no mega contract, nothing like there was with Santana. Hard to find anyway to discredit Peavy.
Does anyone have a clue as to what moves were made last winter that Cashman did not approve of?
Betsy,
Its not a question of “giving up” on Hughes.
I wouldn’t trade him unless I get a Top 10, ready to go, starting pitcher.
Roy Halliday, Jake Peavy, those kind of guys.
If those guys were on the table, and it took Phil Hughes to get either guy, you have to do it. You just do.
Those guys are too good to pass on.
I’m not saying that will happen. Only bringing up the circumstances that would have to happen for me to include Hughes in a deal.
I’m glad Cashman is fighting back with Francesa. Its one thing to discuss the team. Its another to come off like an uninformed jerk. Which Francesa is prone to do with him.
*Peavy
Francesa should tell Brian how the yanks should have gotten Bronson Arroyo for this past season.
I will be completely disgusted if they don’t do everything in their power to sign Sabathia. As for the people here saying signing FA pitchers means getting someone who’s “unreliable,” and advocating going with young pitchers, how reliable were Hughes and Kennedy? How’d that work out for ya? These are the same wantwits who naysayed Santana, and for half the season yammered about how he was washed up. How’d that work out? This team needs pitching, proven pitching! Yes, there’s a risk involved, but there’s risk involved in going with youth too, as we have all too painfully experienced this year. How much do you trust the Yankee player development people’s judgment after this year? As for Sabathia, he’s in his prime, and has been dominant for the past two years. Enough said. They blew it with Santana. They can’t blow it again. Cashman can’t be that stupid, can he?
Mike is trying to corner on the defensive liabilities of the outfield.
This is great. Cash dumps on Bobby by omission. He’s positively glowing in his praise of JD (but does acknowledge his arm is weak).
I’m not going to pretend that the idea of trading Phil kills me. I have no idea what’s going on with SD, so I’m not going to worry about it for now. I still don’t think he’s going anywhere.
I’m not familiar with Casey Kotchman – is he “gettable”?
What is Fatso getting on Cash’s case about now? Brian should just say “forget it” and never go on WFAN again; he could easily reach a large Yankee audience with Michael Kay.
His interview with Francesa right now pretty much signals Abreu’s end in NY.
When assessing the OF play, he said they were “fine” in left and center. The OF was “good in left and center”.
Not exactly a ringing endorsement in bringing Bobby back.
Didn’t think he would come back but, Cash seems to be putting the hammer down on that one now.
Take the draft picks Cash. Its the best way to go in this situation.
Cashman just said one possibility is that Melky, Damon and Gardner could be there for spring training and take it from there.
Trevor,
He’s right. Go to the Dodgers, Brewers, Padres, or Rockies and offer them Jackson for Kemp, Holiday, or Peavy. They will laugh and hang up. They could get MUCH better deals for cost controlled young players and in Holliday’s case, a legit RBI bat who could have a Manny-like impact on a team for 1 season.
Hughes and Cano are indeed the only trade chips we have for legit players.
Giambi’s “big” option will not be exercised. Hope they told Giambi.
What a stupid question Diet Coke !
Meant to say Cashman was talking about the OF defense.
SJ I will always hold open hopes for Abreu but understand he may not be back.
I adjust readily and quickly.
True about Abreu…
OMG enough with Santana Francesa
lol wow I guess Abreu isin’t coming back. Cashman went for the throat on that one.
Cash better have a replacement.
GOOD FOR YOU BRIAN!
Won’t play that game (if you had it to do over again would you get Santant)
Cashman actually said he is comfortable with the decision he made and would do it again.
GOOD ON YA BRI!
I love the guy.
“Cano, Veras, Kennedy and Hughes for Peavy and Adrian Gonzalez.â€
What are you smoking? And can I have some?
I understand, SJ……I think I learned a lesson about not getting too attached to prospects. It’s too late for me with Phil, but from now on…..
In any case, as long as he’s in pinstripes, at least we can follow him in the AFL. I’m excited to see the progress he makes – it’s fascinating to watch young players evolve into all-stars (like Jeter, Mo, Andy, etc..). Obviously I’m not putting Phil there now, but the point is, if he does become a top pitcher, the journey to that point would have been half the fun.
Cashman was talking about LF and CF when discussing Melky, Johnny and Brett.
He wasn’t talking about any of those guys playing RF.
Saying Peavy “chokes” in a small sample size of playoff numbers is the classic way on how not to use statistics.
“lol wow I guess Abreu isin’t coming back. Cashman went for the throat on that one.”
Tank what exactly did he say? I’m multitasking over here so am not being able to listen to every single word.
Watching the press conference it was clear Abreu Giambi are gone.
Shouldn’t you guys be glad Francessa is asking tough questions and getting honest answers out of Cashman rather than the vanilla, generic interviews Cashman usually gives?
Cash likes Nady. Cool.
Cash has Johnny in left
X-man playing every day
Abreu? Left out.
“I will always maintain that he knows baseball and the market a lot better than Yankee fans do.”
That’s bold!
I bet ya Girardi can outmanage the fans as well.
It still boggles the mind that media (nevermind the fans) simply do NOT understand why the Yankees chose not to make a deal for Santana. They did it for the future, knowing that possibly they wouldn’t make the playoffs this year. Unbelievable, like Santana (NOT his fault) would have guaranteed the Yankees anything – Mets? out of playoffs. Twins when he was there? Didn’t get past the first round (and he didn’t pitch that great in some of those games).
If I were Cash, I’d flip off Mike.
IMO, in Cashman’s perfect world, Gardner would hit and patrol CF.
What a stupid question about Nady. I think he’s still bitter that Nady’s not on his beloved Mets.
Except when he over thought rain delays…
This is a very good interview— Brian is being honest.
mel
Francessa is a Yankee fan.
“I bet ya Girardi can outmanage the fans as well.”
I bet ya that too!
pat,
Oops. Who’s the Mets fan?
Benigno, Evans, Summers on WFAN are Mets fans
Vrsce: Ah, I’m very very not religious.
***
Dang, Cashman is really feisty today.
This is a good interview. The topic re: injury disclosure is good stuff.
Fascinating behind-the-scenes of Mo-gate.
Betsy,
To be fair to Santana, the Mets BP is deplorable. They blew 29 saves, 11 of them in the 9th inning. Santana did not lose a game in the final 3 months of the season. You give them an average bullpen — hell, if Wagner was healthy and an average SU man and they win 100 games going away.
Santana did everything he could. Dismissing the Santana trade and using the “Mets missed the playoffs” as the example that there would be no guarantee is not accurate.
The Mets missed the playoffs by 1 game and blew 29 saves this year.
Cash throwing Mo & Joe under the bus! lol.
So overblown.
“Mets ace Johan Santana had left knee surgery on Wednesday to repair a torn meniscus, SI.com has learned.”
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.c.....index.html
cb-
since run differential (which is related to won/loss) is determined by both hitting and pitching we could go round and round on this one for a long time.
i’m old school in the sense that i like a well pitched game that makes the players play to the game. i think that when the players lose confidence in the pitchers they see on the mound offense itself is affected.
the two are not independent of each other. mostly hitting when you’re behind is different than hitting mostly when you are ahead.
unless you get so far behind there is no pressure and then hitting kicks back in.
my question is what is cashman going to do different this year? hughes, kennedy, and joba should still be developed. brackman and others should be developed. how do they do it this time differently.
i mentioned it last night ,but minnesota twins pitchers rarely hit the rotation until they are on average 25 and then after a year or two of up and down between the minors and majors.
does cashman still think as a general rule that gifted 22 year olds are ready for the rigors of a mlb season?
does he still have a minor league system that doesn’t teach brett gardner how to bunt?
so cashman is fiesty and defiant. does that mean more of the same but with more intensity or is he’s going to channel that energy into making changes not only to others but to himself because he really has been part of the problem.
the yankee minor league system produces plays that are not ready to play at the major league level. how is that going to change?
how do you go younger when your own system doesn’t teach young players to play? notice that a player like ransom learned to play somewhere else( and for a really long time). is he really the best the yankees can produce at the minor league level on offense?
he was this year.
I’m loving Cash in this interview
I was ticked off at Francessa initially for attacking Cashman but he turned it into a great interview.
No way Cashman would have been this honest if Francessa was nice and stayed within boundaries.
Not too happy looking at Peavy’s road numbers this year. Some of his other numbers–WHIP, H/9, BB/K, etc are down a little bit this year as well, although well within an expected amount of fluctuation. I am not sure if the sub-par road ERA is a product of one or two shellackings, or if it is a product of PETCO fever. I would certainly investigate that before giving every valuable young player to the Padres. I wasn’t real impressed with the way he pitched against us, got flustered real quick, but it was also his second start off of the DL. All of that being said, I would jump on it in a minute if it’s a reasonable deal for the Yanks.
So according to Cashman Wang and Joba have guarantee spots in the rotation. That leaves 3 spots open. My thought is 1 will be Sabathia, I do think they will get him. The other one will either Pettitte or Mussina. That leaves the last one. Hughes is not promised a spot but I do think he will win it out of ST.
Sabathia Wang Joba Mussina/Pettitte Hughes
OR
Sign 2 FA starters and not bring back either Mussina or Pettitte. And go with…
Sabathia Wang Joba Burnett Hughes
Let me get this straight:
Cashman actually claimed on live air the Abreu and Giambi isn’t coming back next season?
Can someone give some running updates on what Cash is saying? I can’t catch the interview but I can read the blog. Thanks!
Harwood…interesting info…
i wish I could hear this interview. We need Pat to transcribe!
I believe though that if he really is intent on letting Bobby and G go that has has to make an offensive splash.
Or a splash for the offense that is.
Lord knows he’s made his share of “offensive splashes” over the years.
harwood: AHAHAHA
Could you imagine, if Santana was on the Yankees and needed the surgery?
Hope Santaa recovers all right. But if he was on the Yankees some fan here would be killing Cashman for trading for an injury prone pitcher
Dave D,
Well, Cash pushed back and Mike’s backed off. If he kept up the aggressive attacks, it wouldn’t be a very good interview at all.
“Cashman actually claimed on live air the Abreu and Giambi isn’t coming back next season?”
Not directly – but it was fairly clear if you pay attention to what he said. No final decisions have been made.
“Cashman actually claimed on live air the Abreu and Giambi isn’t coming back next season?”
He said they wont pick up Giambi’s option. But said he will decide whether to bring him back or not. As a bench player Id assume. Aberu I think he just alluded that right field is Nady’s leaving no room for Aberu.
Ed: Cashman claimed they wouldn’t exercise Giambi’s option, but didn’t say they wouldn’t retain him.
Basically outright said that Joba is a starter.
If I had DVR I’d go back and transcribe, but, alas, I do not.
Rebecca but it was his knee not his arm..
“Francessa is a Yankee fan.”
so he says. i just think he plays one on the radio…
Ed,
They’ll talk about it in the winter mtgs, but they aren’t picking up Giambi’s option for sure.
Trevor,
I think its too dangerous to have Joba and Hughes in the rotation at the same time. They will both be on innings limits. A better idea (IMO) would be to slot Joba in the rotation, stash Hughes in AAA. Joba can be skipped on off days and the Yanks could call Hughes up once in awhile to take some of Joba’s starts. Also Hughes would be the first called up in case of injury. This way both guys can limit their innings while also getting major league experience.
Its absolutely essential to keep the veterans on a constant rotation of a normal 5 man rotation. HOwever, Girardi might have to get a bit creative with the young guys to keep their innings low.
Cashman: There will be no wholesale changes and they will look at things individually and try and improve. Will not make moves just because and just for the sake of it.
Bronx Jeers
Would love to oblige but Cash is way too long winded for me to keep up. Go to WFAN.com later this afternoon and they’ll have the audio posted there.
We need to post the audio link when it comes up. Great attitude, great stuff.
Changes, they are a-coming.
Brandon: Ah, but it was Wang’s foot and Phil’s rib!
pat,
I know why I got confused. Francessa wanted Arroyo for the Yankees. No real Yankee fan would think that’s good. (j/k Brandon!)
Stealth Cashman is the most fun. There will be a couple of players on this team come spring training that no one here has even thought of yet.
“The pitching was good enough to still win”
Hate to disagre but it really wasn’t. 15th best team era (4.28)in baseball? The Chisox have the highest team era of any team in the playoffs (4.06) The pitching was mediocre.
The Yankees scored more runs than half of the teams in the playoffs the problem is they gave up more than any team in the playoffs.
Giving IPk and Hughes 17 starts with nothing to show for it was, in hindsight, an error. Where would the yankees be if they went 8-9 in those starts? Throw in Rasner and Ponson giving them 35 starts and 9 wins and thats 52 starts and 9 wins to show for it. The pitching really wasn’t good enough to win.
The offence did underperform, scored 200 less runs than the year before, but the pitching was not good enough.
Ah, nothing like a new 3 year deal to get him off his talking points! lol
They will probably have that interview up on the WFAN website later today.
For those unable to listen to the entire interview, its worth a listen.
He doesn’t give you much. However, if you listen closely, he pretty much outlines how they are going to hit the off-season.
Overall, especially on team and Girardi issues, he was very forthcoming.
I’m not the biggest Francesa fan in the world but, he did a good job on this one.
Francessa is a Yankee fan, he is just disgusted about not getting Santana and the year they had. He has attacked the Mets this entire week so far, did you hear his interview with Roberts?
Francessa lived through the glory days, the bronx zoo and everything inbetween. Just because people disagree with him on Santana (a sentiment in which a lot of people share, re: not getting Santana was a mistake) doesn’t make him less of a fan.
So if Francessa was against the trade, it would make him more of a fan?
mel
I can’t hate on him too much because Bernie was one of his favorite Yankees and he was one of mine too.
Mel, Rebecca, and Harwood –
thanks for clearing it up with me. I wasn’t really paying much attention to it.
Harwood – I think if Giambi badly wants to come back, I also think he would come back as a bench player. The question is, would he really accept it?
Cashman was was just on Mike Francesca, and he expected Damon to play in the outfield next season, and put him in the mix to play center. He also gave Nady a vote of confidence. I’m not crazy about an outfield of Nady, Damon, Gardner/Cabrera. We need a CF that can hit. Damon’s days of being an everyday CF are long gone.
Ed–no problem.
I was kind of amazed at how forthcoming Cashman was.
Tom,
To be fair, the offense should’ve been able to pick up 6 more wins. A base knock here, a base knock there. We squandered dozens of chances in the 8th & 9th innings alone. The bullpen was terrific.
The biggest reason we’re not going to the playoffs is the emergence of the Rays. The Yankees won’t repeat the mistake of the past year. They’re going all out from game 1. If you have to rotate players out to keep them fresh, do it. But they cannot afford to pace themselves as usual.
Please pass on CC. His arm is going to explode when Mil. is done with him. Sign Tex instead!
Braintrust,
He has to look like he has options for every position internally. Otherwise he looks cornered in any negotiation he goes into.
Rebecca –
I think this time Cashman means business and gave us some straight forward answers.
In the previous thread, you mentioned that Church hated playing for the Mets. Do you think you see him being traded or released for saying “the team is full of choke artists.”? (Brandon, you should be happy after reading this. lol)
Impression I get from the interview -
- No Giambi or Abreu
- No trade or FA signing for CF. Will be Gardner.
- Don’t think he’ll trade any of the old vets (Damon, Matsui), especially Damon, talked highly of him.
- Likes Nady, could see an extension in his future.
- Glowing praise of Coke and likes Marte, seems to like the idea of 2 quality lefties in the pen and will hang onto Marte.
- They will explore the trade market and Hughes would likely be available, likely as the plan B for Sabathia.
- Will be aggressive in the FA market but look for ’smarter’ deals (a la Lowe). Won’t go crazy on Sabathia bidding.
- Knows the team was flawed and made some mistakes last off-season and maybe overestimated the kids. Will not do that this year
Francessa brought up one good point imo. Offense was down drastically in baseball this year. By that standard, the improvement of team ERA from 2007 to 2008 was to some extent to be expected, or at the least, not as impressive as it might at first seem.
Just because the offense was putrid this year, and it was, doesn’t mean we can neglect the pitching.
was Omar Minya Steve Phillip’s assistant GM? He is seriously following Phillip’s footsteps. I could see why Omar always signing/trading for old players like Alou and Easley.
Also as usual, didn’t mention Kennedy– he is clearly out of our plans.
Ed: I was’t the one that mentioned it. I just kind of hate him for his my-girlfried-is-doomed-because-she-is-jewish comments.
Is it me or did Cashman kind of throw Kennedy under a bus?
Braintrust
Doesn’t help Cashman’s negotiating strength to say the Yanks need a CFer. He said Bubba Crosby was going to be the CFer before Damon was signed and Betemit was going to be the 3rd baseman before A-Rod opted back in last year.
Don’t take all he says at this time of the year as gospel.
“Please pass on CC. His arm is going to explode when Mil. is done with him. Sign Tex instead!”
Some guys have ‘rubber arms’ (David Wells is a recent example) – They can pitch lots of innings and lots of pitches.
CC has the body type that might allow him to show this ability. Remember guys used to pitch crazy numbers of innings per year – they were just conditioned to do it.
YankeeJosh –
Actually offense was not down drastically. It was down slightly. Part way through the season Replacement Level Yankees blog did an analysis of league-wide offense and came to the conclusion that there was a statistically significant decrease in offense this year. However as the season came to a close that decrease became less and less. In fact, Replacement Level wrote this 2 days ago,
One other thing, while offense in the AL was down for most of this year compared to last year, the difference has narrowed signficantly of late to the point that it’s probably no longer statistically significant. The league average line of .268/.336/.420 equates to a BR/650 of 80 this season compared last year’s line of .271/.338/.423 which equates to a BR/650 of 81. The BR(batting runs) I’ll be using here are context-neutral raw batting runs using linear weights, not position-adjusted or adjusted for base-out states.
I missed the interview on FAN.
If Cash is talking like Abreu is a thing of the past, then I’m really enthused with the initial thoughts he’s putting out there.
Things I like; Real 1b, no Abreu, Joba definitely in rotation
That’s a good start.
Here’s my question to those of you who listened — did he mention Nady as a RF’er or did you get an impression that Nady might be trade bait this off season?
Rebecca –
oh okay, thanks for the clarification. Such a racist comment though.
Burnett is still a possibility as a FA.
But with Joba and Wang and Hughes, you’ve still stayed relatively young.
Joba
Wang
Hughes
Moose
Burnett
Not necessarily in that order.
Just a thought.
In the previous thread, you mentioned that Church hated playing for the Mets. Do you think you see him being traded or released for saying “the team is full of choke artists.�
Oh wait. What did i miss? Church actually said that?
how about this for the 2009 yankees
1B- Tex
2B- Hudson
SS- Jeter
3B- Alex
C- Posada
RF- Nady
CF- Kemp
LF- Damon
bench- Blake, Gardner, Ransom, Cabrera
SP- Wang, Lowe, Joba, Mussolini, Hughes
BP- Marte, Coke, Bruney, Veras, Melancon, War, Rivera
“my question is what is cashman going to do different this year? hughes, kennedy, and joba should still be developed. brackman and others should be developed. how do they do it this time differently.”
randy,
good points again. I don’t think Cashman is a very rigid guy. I think he’s pragmatic. The reason why I’m supportive of him is that I generally think he’s willing to learn from what hasn’t worked and to try to enact change. He’s not going to try to keep doing the same thing over and over just to prove himself correct.
Case in point – the young pitching. People keep saying that he’s very invested in Hughes, etc. True. But at the same time listening to him it’s very clear that he looks at penciling hughes and kennedy into the rotation as a big mistake. He’s all but said that he will not do that again. So he’s agreeing with you – a year too late perhaps but he’s agreeing. He’s not an ideologue about these things. He looks to see what’s worked/ not worked and tries to adjust.
In any organization/ business that’s a major issue. Far too often you get people who just keep doing things the same way. That’s not Cashman.
Your points about the poverty in the organization about coaching and player development are all very good ones. And I agree. We may differ on this but that is really an ownership issue.
For two long the yankees just haven’t paid enough attention to building a full organization rather than just assembling 25 guys in a dugout. I think Cashman is trying to do that. But to build that organization is very difficult, especially given the complexities of the yankees ownership, etc.
Let me give you an example about an area that I know a little bit about – statistics. I can tell you that just listening to what Cashman says has changed markedly over the years in terms of what analytics he has at his disposal. I can literally hear it. Now not saying that it’s enough – but it’s a big time difference from before. And that’s because the yankees finally hired someone to do some stats for the team. That’s an ownership issue – George just didn’t want to move in that direction.
A concrete example – we just heard it in his press conference and on that WFAN interview.
Cashman very pointedly honed in on Bobby Abreu’s defense. I can tell you he wouldn’t have been able to point out specifically how big a problem that was a couple of years ago.
Abreu was the single worst defensive player in baseball this year. He was astoundingly bad. Just listening to how emphatically Cashman made that point, how specifically he referred to it – I would guess that he knows exactly – in a quantitative sense – how utterly bad Abreu was in the field. I also get the sense that this information was available to him – before it wouldn’t have been.
The yankees organization in terms of scouting and coaching is not where it needs to be. But I think that this is an ongoing issue of ownership/ other executives outside of cashman. I think he needs to fight to get things that other GM’s can get.
One of the biggest differences between the Sox and the Yankees and one of the least appreciated is John Henry. Henry made his money in hedge funds – but it’s the way that he made it that’s interesting. As I understand it he did a great deal of computerized, automated trading based on trading algorithms.
You see that influence of his on the organization in its quantitative, analytic approach. That’s just one example. Henry knows how to build an organization/ business from scratch in a rational, methodical way.
From ownership down the yankees just don’t have that kind of organizational capacity building. I think Cashman is and has been lobbying to expand those capabilities in the yanks. I think they are moving in that direction – just not as fast as any of us would like.
add Molina to the bench
Cheers Pat,
I still appreciate all the postgame work you did. You’re not a court reporter or anything like that are you?
G. Love -
He’s high on Nady but wouldn’t commit. So he basically said they have to take a look at the situation but he could see Nady as part of the team.
No commitment either way but he is happy with the guy.
He sounded firm that Nady will be in RF next year. Really likes him as a player and likes the job he did this year.
I agree with him. You don’t need all stars at every position.
The guy is a solid player, drove in important runs, plays hard every day, and is under 30.
The kind of player the Yankees are looking to acquire, not get rid of.
“Here’s my question to those of you who listened — did he mention Nady as a RF’er or did you get an impression that Nady might be trade bait this off season?”
He said Nady had shown enough to be an everyday player for the team. Never mentioned Nady in CF, (only melky, brett, and Damon). Only mentioned Damon for LF.
testG. Love: Cashman more or less said that Nady would have a role on the team.
Rebecca,
I didn’t hear what he said. I think he’s going to make Kennedy earn every start he gets. They’re going to make him change his attitude. Something is up mentally with Kennedy. He’s not the same guy that flew through the Yankee system.
I hope that Kennedy pays heed and not end up a journeyman. One thing is clear, nobody’s going to want to trade for him if he doesn’t get more efficient, esp. with the BB’s.
Pat- everyone on the face of God’s green earth knows Damon can’t play CF anymore. If he said he was giving Gardner a shot, and will have him compete with Cabrera and Christian, or other options, I can see that. But don’t BS the fans and tell us he can play CF. He has no arm, and can’t get to alot of balls anymore, despite what Cashman thinks.
SA –
Bronx Jeers posted this up in the previous thread:
Ed, I’m pretty sure Bronx Jeers made that up…
CB makes a good point.
Cash said stuff, both in the PC and to Francesa, he would have never said publicly a year ago.
Like I said, a 3 year deal gives you onions! lol
Seriously, it was refreshing how pissed he sounded about the way the season went and how much he wants to win.
To me, its a helluva lot more refreshing than hearing Fred Wilpon and Omar Minaya say their team “overachieved” this year when, anybody who follows the game knows that’s BS.
Ed: Holy crap, he said that!?
WOW. That…uh…that makes John Rocker look positively soft.
Thanks guys. I’m pissed I missed the interview. Stupid work related conference calls!
I’m totally on board with Nady in RF.
I feel like Abreu has shown us what he is — a notorious slow starter who paces himself through the season into good numbers.
Maybe Nady might be one of the guys to come out of the gate and play his tail off, especially since next year is a contract year.
Here’s the good news — Damon and Nady in contract years next year is a good thing.
I can’t wait to see what the CF plan turns out to be and the 1b.
I don’t need all stars there. I want solid smart picks that fit into a concept for the team. More than that though, I want some thought to go into the player personality since I think that is so important.
Oh. He didn’t say that? And my (limited) faith in humanity is restored…
“To me, its a helluva lot more refreshing than hearing Fred Wilpon and Omar Minaya say their team “overachieved†this year when, anybody who follows the game knows that’s BS.”
But SJ – Omar and Wilpon “love where the Mets’ brand is”
what a contrast!
Trisha,
There are no lefties in that rotation and that really hampers a managers ability to match up the rotatation against better teams. Substitute CC for Burnett and I like it.
I know I’m in the minority here but I’d also prefer Pettitte to come back instead of Mussina. This past year notwithstanding, Andy has the better track record of being able to go deeper into games, giving more innings, and being more effective. He’s also a couple years younger than Mussina. If he comes back healthy next year, I can see a big bounceback year, and since he had a bad year this year he might be able to be signed at a reduced rate.
I’m not sure Mussina can duplicate the amazing year he had this year again, next year. And I’d rather not pay him for this year when production might significantly decrease next year.
Owner of the Rays on WFAN. This could be worth a listen.
“But he warned fans against expecting the Yankees to get certain players. That means CC Sabathia.”
Or it means Mark Teixera, or it means AJ Burnett, or it means Manny Ramirez, or it means Ben Sheets……the list goes on and on and claiming it means one person with such certainty is somewhat speculative and careless.
Oh. He didn’t say that? And my (limited) faith in humanity is restored…
Rebecca – Same here. can’t believe I foolishly believed him.
It’s got to be a disgrace to be a Met fan and hear that ownership group come out and call the year a success.
I’m glad Cashman is coming out swinging.
He has a lot of work to do and he has to act faster from now on than he has shown in the past.
I think a lot of times he sees the problems we all see with the team and sits and waits for the trend to change too long.
A team filled with quality depth mitigates the Cano/Melky/Kennedy type disasters of this year.
Braintrust,
To be fair, Cashman did point out Damon’s weak arm. Best, best case scenario is Brett continues to hit next season.
Ed – is that really what Church said?!
The Cashman interview is up on WFAN website.
Its on the front page of wfan.com or go to this link: http://www.wfan.com/topic/play.....topic=true
I think Andy comes back and Moose retires. Unless he changes his mind in December, I think Moose is done.
If that’s the case, he picked a great way to go out.
Sometimes this blog is like a giant game of “telephone” and it’s quite funny.
I did make that up but I admitted it in the same post.
October 1st, 2008 at 12:50 pm
“Could someone fill me in why Church hates the Mets?â€
Church’s Quote:
†I nearly had my brains spilled out on the outfield grass and they expect me to play 2 weeks later? Some guys like this manager, other like that one. There’s a bunch of cry baby choke artists polluting the clubhouse and the GM’s totally incompetent. Oh, And the fans are as fickle as they come. But other than that, I like playing here.â€
actually I just made that up but it sounds about right?
These press conferences/ interviews show why many of us are supportive of Cashman.
It would have been much, much easier for him to just be defensive and deny the problems that existed in such a public forum.
Instead he was fully accountable for why the team underperformed. He wasn’t BS’ing anyone or making excuses. He gave reasons for why things failed to explain/ understand how they can fix this thing rather than just cover things up and make excuses.
Can’t fix a problem unless you admit it’s there. To come out and just say we’re too old is a very candid thing to say. You can tell his priority is to get younger.
Did we hear anything like that from Omar? A team whose age has killed it over and over?
CB: Yeah, but Minaya got Santana so he ought to be sainted.
Thanks Ed
Rebecca and Patrick –
Apparently that “made up post” is true. Matthew Cerrone of the Metsblog is still trying to figure out if Church does like playing for the Mets.
Church loved NYC 5 weeks ago
Apparently that “made up post†could be true***
No doubt CB. Cash couldn’t have been more honest. As a fan, and a longtime season ticketholder, its refreshing.
If I was a Mets fan today, I wouldn’t be too happy with what I heard from Wilpon and Minaya. It pure spin and BS.
Cash isn’t spinning or BS’ing anybody. It doesn’t mean they will win a World Series next year.
It does mean that he recognizes the good and bad in the organization and is committed to fixing it. Its all you can ask for from the guy.
Braintrust
I believe Damon will be the everyday CFer more than I believed Betemit was going to be the everyday 3rd baseman.
Give Stealth Cashman a chance.
ooohhh so it was a made up quote. lol
Would be kinda…oh I dunno…bad if he did say that. lol
SJ: What did Minaya and Wilpon say?
SA: No kidding. No pun intended, but Church would have been crucified.
Rebecca,
They said they were very happy with their team because it “overachieved” this year.
I guess that’s how they decided to take on the choking their team did but, that’s what they said.
Right now it’s all talk, but at least the talk sounds right.
I just hope we’re not being placated and end up with Giambi, Abreu and Oliver Perez on opening day.
The good/refreshing thing is to hear that he sees and feels the things a lot of have this season and he’s not trying to spin the failure of the season/team this year.
I really am excited to see what Cash does this offseason.
For me, I think the safest free agent options and really the most palatable would be to try and sign Mark Teixeira to fill the hole at first base and Derek Lowe to patch the hole in the rotation.
I don’t think people realize just how good and consistent Tex is. Have any doubts, check out his career stats. Besides being a perennial gold-glover at first, he would allow the team to pencil in 30-HR 100-RBI in the middle of the lineup each year. With Abreu and Giambi likely gone, a high .OBP guy in the middle of the lineup to protect A-Rod is crucial.
He’s also still under 30. So what if Boras is his agent. Forget this talk about 10-year deals from Boras. Not going to happen. Make a run at Tex, you patch a glaring weakness for the next 6 to 7 years. Makes all the sense in the world. It will be the years, and not the money that will make or break the deal.
As for Lowe, he knows the league, would love to stick it to Boston and his sinker is as good as ever. He’s a guy that even when he doesn’t have his A-stuff, manages to give the team 7 innings. He’s a bullpen saver and a quality one.
He may not be as nasty as Burnett, but he has many fewer question marks, and a postseason pedigree.
Rebecca-Oh totally!
Oh my.
If I’m a Mets fan, my horror knows no bounds.
SJ 44 -
I’m a bit confused and could be out of limp. Church did really said that?
“It does mean that he recognizes the good and bad in the organization and is committed to fixing it. Its all you can ask for from the guy.”
You think he’s committed enough to add some quality baseball people to the Baseball Ops group???? This is something you suggested they needed to do recently.
“Abreu was the single worst defensive player in baseball this year. ”
No hyperbole there at all!
Cashman did NOT say that Nady is playing right. He said that he liked what Nady had to offer and could see him on the team but that they would have to obviously look around before they made decisions and that if they found some FA or something they liked better then it would be possible that they would go in that direction. But right now he likes Nady on the team.
Better not to get people reved up and then have them trash Cashman because they think he said something he did not.
I’ll still hope for Abreu but realize it may not happen.
Yankeejosh – I am probably the only one who would not like to see Pettittee return at this point. Oh well!
freedom from expectation is freedom from disappointment
Just had a look at the Metsblog… had to quickly get out as the Orange and Blue colors was making feel dizzy…
“Give Stealth Cashman a chance.”
Yep.
Fredo,
Its happening now. They are in the process of beefing up Billy Eppler’s (pro personnel) department.
Will he had more senior people to higher positions? I don’t know. With Cash back, Stick still has a seat at the table, and that’s a good thing.
Beefing up Eppler’s department was/is VITAL. I think they are also going to revamp their Latin American operations.
Supposedly, they added more scouts in Japan too. I’ve heard that third hand though so I can’t confirm it.
But, the person who told me would be in position to know. He’s tight with Valentine and is wired in pretty well to Japanese Baseball.
You know, I don’t think Cash was dismissing Abreu, in fact I think that he gave Francessa too much credit. When Francessa asked about OF defense, he was talking about throwing arms mostly, and maybe only slightly Abreu. Cash knows the stats were bad on Abreu’s defense and thought that’s where Mike was going, so he didn’t want to get caught in a lie so he emphasized the positives that Gardner and Nady. I didn’t hear him dismiss Abreu, just omit him. Bad defense and all, I find a place for Abreu on a 2 year deal of course I also would like to see Manny as the DH, but obviously not both.
i thought cashman was running the show last winter. what unaapproved moves is he referring to?
They said they were very happy with their team because it “overachieved†this year.
I really need to get the name of the Wilpons drug dealer. Looks like he/she has the good stuff.
Seriously, I can’t believe he said that.
“had” should be “have” more senior people…..
Teixeria’ career OPS is .919
Arod’s is .967
David Ortiz’s is .937
it’s safe to to say Tex is an elite ball player
pat,
I think you’ve hit on a new nickname for Cashman, “Stealthman.”
Quick, everyone:
Who wins today?
I say Phillies, Dodgers based on pitching. Angels, just because.
“i thought cashman was running the show last winter. what unaapproved moves is he referring to?”
Probably the extra year for Posada and giving Arod a pay raise and extra years as punishment for bringing embarassment to himself and the organization.
mel: Phillies, Angels, Cubs.
Cashman listens to WFAN? AHAHAH.
Next thing, you’ll hear he reads LoHud and gets ideas from some of the posters.
Actually, maybe he is one of the posters…
Cashman has a firm idea of where he wants to take this team. They need to get younger, but that’s not tough if you replace Giambi with Teixiera… there’s eight years. CC for Mussina is eleven years more.
I think they would consider Abreu or Giambi as the primary DH IF Matsui wasn’t in the picture, but not otherwise.
I think it’s very important the Yankees build a really good bench so they can use the DH spot on a rotating basis since they have four or five mid-30s guys who can’t grind it day in and day out and be fresh in October. A key to that happening is Matsui being able to play LF at least 2X a week and Damon playing CF 2X a week.
i have yet to read one good idea on here yet…
Rebecca – I wouldn’t be surprised. He probably gets home delivery of The Journal News.
Brian Cashman October 1st, 2008 at 3:03 pm
i have yet to read one good idea on here yet…
Bronson Arroyo. Find a way to get it done
Hey Cash whats up Man. Hear Your presser today, man why so angry? Did’t you know you overachieved man—JUST LIKE MY METS DID Bro, know what I’m sayin.
mel
I think the trades we don’t hear about are always more fun than the ones debated in the press for months.
Nady, Marte and Pudge this year were pretty fly under the radar but David Justice, Clemens 2007 and A-Rod 2004 were stealth.
My guess on the unapproved move would be letting Torre go?
pat: I still think David Justice is one of the best deals that Cashman ever made.
SJ44 -
In his press conference, Brian Cashman directly addressed the Kei Igawa scouting/signing. He admitted there were problems and he said that they had totally revamped the way they scouted in Japan, that they added scouts, that they’re there more often and they have an office there. I’m paraphrasing but I think I got it almost 100% right. The bottom line, and the point he was trying to make, was that they acknowledge there mistakes and make improvements so as not to make the same mistakes, but that doesn’t mean mistakes won’t be made in the future.
Fatcesa talking about the Church comments-said he heard it loud and clear and where he heard it from is his business.
But Church was not happy, did not fit in, was not happy with the team and Francesa was very surprised by it
I missed the WFAN interview with Cashman. SJ44, you mentioned something above that he was addressing the injury disclosure problem. What did he say?
To those that has DirecTv in the NY area:
The Yes channel will be moving to channel 631.
Fatcesa talking about the Church comments-said he heard it loud and clear and where he heard it from is his business.
But Church was not happy, did not fit in, was not happy with the team and Francesa was very surprised by it
SA – Thanks for clearing it up.
Whoa. Cole Hamels.
CB,
I just got home from work and I’m catching up.
I think we all agree on Abreu’s defensive weaknesses. But what kind of statistical analysis is there that proves he was more of a liability defensively than he was an asset offensively?
In other words, can’t a case be made that
his bat helped win more games than his glove lost? I believe Abreu had the highest batting average in the majors with 2 outs and runners in scoring position.
Having watched or seen just about every game this year, I believe he had more to do with winning won more games with his bat than he did losing games with his glove.
I’m not the least bit sold on Nady. He’s a free swinger with 3 times as many strikeouts as he walks for his career. His career obp is only .335, including a pathetic .320 in 59 games with the yankees this year.
Why should we expect one of the better free agent pitchers? Its not like we need pitching or did horribly this season or made no major signings last off season or have a significant amount of payroll coming off … o wait a minute. That is exactly what it is like.
A first baseman to play first base. What a concept? i CANT BELIEVE MY EARS. Cash really knows baseball.
“I missed the WFAN interview with Cashman. SJ44, you mentioned something above that he was addressing the injury disclosure problem. What did he say?”
He offered one of lengthy, mind-numbing answers that drives one to the point of forgetting what their question was.
It was pretty clear his response had been thru the spin cycle once or twice so as not to throw anyone under the bus.
Could Suvem win manager of the year?
* one of those
Doreen,
He was talking about the Mo stuff and how they communicate injuries to the media in general. He made it a point to say, “there are no secrets in NY”, and it sounded like he is going to talk to Girardi about finding a better way to balance that info while not causing competitive advantage issues.
I’m giving you the “short” version. I believe his entire interview is up on the WFAN site now.
Its probably better to listen (when you get the chance) to the entire interview. I don’t want to mis-characterize it.
Watching Cole Hameles should remind everyone why it is too early to give up on Hughes.
That could be Hughes next year.
Francessa was trying to get Cash to admit that letting Johan go was a mistake, but Brian wouldn’t bite. And nor should he. I can’t believe that people who watched this team for 162 games think that with everything that happened being equal, we would have won more games if we had Santana. Would having Santana prevent Jorge’s shoulder from going bad? What effect would he have had on Matsui’s knees? What about CMW? Would he have taught him to run the bases more carefully?
The Yankees didn’t score enough runs! It didn’t matter who was on the mound. We would not have won if we had Santana. End of discussion.
Doreen
Check out the interview on WFAN.com yourself. It’s worth the listen.
Cashman needs to shake up Girardi’s staff. Not looking for a scapegoat, but finding guys who could be fire to Joe’s ice and help Girardi become a better manager. Also create a better support system for the players and have some more experience on the staff.
The Yankees didn’t score enough runs! It didn’t matter who was on the mound. We would not have won if we had Santana. End of discussion.
Preach!
Now if Joba was in the bullpen, we would have made the playoffs? These callers make me laugh..
SJ:
I thought the answer on the Mo/injury question from Francessa was the one spot in the interview where Cashman’s answer was heavily fertilized.
That is a pretty big accusation Francessa is making about Church. Even if it is true, I doubt whoever told it to him wanted him to divulge it. Now that will be a huge distraction in ST and he will be a target. It even hurts his trade value because teams know Omar might be trying to get rid of him because he hates it in NY.
t-rock,
Cole Hameles has an 80 changeup. On the same level as Santana. Hughes doesn’t have a pitch as close to dominant as that. Plus he is a lefty. Poor comparison.
I wouldn’t mind having Cole Hamels on my team.
But it’d take Robbie and AJax and Melancon to get him. And that would make me sad.
A couple of points to make about pitchers.
1.Yea Jake Peavy played in a pitcher’s park, but how much did that benefit him? He’s a strike out pitcher who gets a bunch of ground balls. If fly balls were the way he got a majority of his outs I could understandHe has a career .246 BAA, 3.80 ERA, and 1.30 WHIP away. He’s played in 30 less games away than at home, but the guy can pitch anywhere. He is one of the top 10 pitchers in the game, and yes he is better than Wang. Wang is a number 1 pitcher but not a true ace, but Peavy is. Peavy with our offense and bullpen could win 15-20 games easily.
2.There was a day and age when pitchers could pitch 500 innings and stay healthy.In 1999-2000, hell he made it to 2003 until he became unhealthy.Same with Schilling, and many other healthy pitchers in the late 90s early 2k’s. Pitchers are capable of Sabathia’s workload without incident.Even if he might be unavailable for a year he’d still make us a contender every year of a 5-7 year deal he was healthy, and he would give us his all. Hell Lincecum has been abused more than Sabathia this year, would you pass him up as well based on that? Pitchers are capable of going on after a year of “abuse” they’ve done it in recent past without incident. CC is a big strong guy who has not had arm troiuble in the past.
“Watching Cole Hameles should remind everyone why it is too early to give up on Hughes.
That could be Hughes next year.”
I’d settle for Hughes being either of this afternoon’s starting pitchers. But I’d still move him in a package for Peavy.
For those that have asked, the problems last winter had to do with the length of the contracts. He didnt want to go past 8 years for Arod, past 3 years for Jorge or past 2 years for Mo. This didnt come up today, but has been reported previously – maybe even by Pete.
I don’t know Fredo. The Yankees are usually very guarded with injury info.
When he started talking about, “there are no secrets in NY”, and how, “this (the NY market) is different than anywhere in the country”, it was clear he was talking about Girardi.
When he talked about how “players on the team give up the info”, and how the media in town, “has a good relationship with support members on the staff”, it sounded to me like he was giving a tutorial to Girardi about how its impossible to keep a lid on certain things.
I know he hasn’t liked getting bothered about this stuff this year. That’s the manager’s domain and I believe that area will be better handled in 2009.
I just thought it was an interesting window into how they see issues like this from the inside.
Rebecca – The Phillies are getting a new GM. You think Cashman could lure the new GM into taking a really cheap package, like some B/C prospects for Hamels?
“I’d settle for Hughes being either of this afternoon’s starting pitchers. But I’d still move him in a package for Peavy.”
I think that people need to realize that pitching in the NL is quite different from pitching in the AL. Look at what CC is doing. No way he has that kind of success in the AL. Just because Peavy is a stud in the NL doesn’t mean that he will be one if he were to move to the AL.
It makes me happy to hear this–I was all for re-signing A-Rod, but not to a ten year deal. That’s going to come back to bite us in the end.
Absolutely, if Peavy can be had for Hughes, then as Michael Kay says, I would tell Hughes “SEEE YAA!!!”
Ed: If only.
“The Phillies are getting a new GM. You think Cashman could lure the new GM into taking a really cheap package, like some B/C prospects for Hamels?”
Hamels is one of the young stars for PHI. I don’t see them moving him for even a mega package. Maybe if you throw in A-Rod and agree to pay for his entire contract…..
Utley with the the Jeter move.
Nice to see Hamels learn from last season’s playoffs.
Stuff or not, Hughes is still 2 years younger than Hamels.
Let’s give Hughes a chance.
Beckett and Burnett adjusted to the AL quite nicely.
All depends on the pitcher. Guys like Oliver Perez, Sheets, and Dempster would be disasters in the AL.
“It makes me happy to hear this–I was all for re-signing A-Rod, but not to a ten year deal. That’s going to come back to bite us in the end.”
Rebecca, I see this posted here often and I just think that we have no way of knowing what’s going to happen at the end of Alex’s contract. I’ve decided to be optimistic and believe that he is going to continue to take extra care of himself (ever notice how he NEVER joins in during the mob walk off celebrations?)and be the same hitting stud that he is today. We will see.
Didn’t somebody compare Clippard with Peavy last year, saying they had similar changeups?
“I don’t know Fredo. The Yankees are usually very guarded with injury info.”
SJ:
Agreed. In the interview he addressed specifically the Rivera case. He indicated Mo wanted to be very up front with everyone about the shoulder issue. Then the organization (read: Cashman, Girardi, etc) to get on the same page about how’d they present it to the media. When Joe was about to issue the party line, Mo changed his mind.
Whole answer seemed a little Obama-esque to me, but I found him to be otherwise forthright in both the PC and interview.
Laura: Indeed, I’m hoping for the best, but in this case history is not on our side.
“Just because Peavy is a stud in the NL doesn’t mean that he will be one if he were to move to the AL”
So Peavy’s National League work doesn’t translate to the AL but Phil Hughes’ INTERnational League work does??? Is that what I’m to understand???
speaking of luring a GM into taking cheap package for a SP, I found out the Kevin Towers works really well with Brian Cashman. Since 1998, he and Cashman made 9 deals more than any other GMs.
“Didn’t somebody compare Clippard with Peavy last year, saying they had similar changeups?”
then that somebody was a moron.
I dont see Hamels going anywhere… Hamels and Myers are a nice 1-2 in the NL.
i could see Ryan Howard made available, as they have shown no desire to extend him to a long term deal knowing how much its going to cost.
but that would cost a huge bounty of players Cashman would never give up to get him.
if Burrell doesnt resign with the Phillies, I wonder if they’d be open to Matsui on a short term contracy to play LF in the NL. that LF is tiny enough for even Godzilla to patrol and stay healthy.
they’ve got a kid, Jason Donald, who played in the futures game who could be a potential SS replacement in the next couple years. he’d be a nice pickup for Cashman if he could swing a deal.
Peavy’s stuff WILL translate to the AL. Watch him pitch. He has CY Young stuff and is as competitive as it gets.
Hughes straight up wouldn’t even get him.
We also gave the Padres Scott Patterson
Howard also strikes out a heck of a lot.
“So Peavy’s National League work doesn’t translate to the AL but Phil Hughes’ INTERnational League work does??? Is that what I’m to understand???”
Well, I don’t know, Fredo. I never said anything about Hughes in my original post. Perhaps you are mixing up two different posts. All I said was that we shouldn’t assume that Peavy was going to dominate the AL hitters. I haven’t commented about Hughes at all (which should tell ya something).
Laura:
My bad. I may have been confusing you with Betsy, who I? believe was arguing against the idea of using Hughes as the centerpiece of an offer for Peavy.
Sorry about that.
“Howard also strikes out a heck of a lot.”
That’s what I said to the people who want Adam Dunn and I got hit over the head with the “strikeouts don’t matter” argument. How can they not matter? Howard was completely useless the first half of the season. He’s been a monster the second half, but that doesn’t change that he stunk early on.
Howard also hits a ton of bombs.
he’s not a perfect 1B by any means, prob eventually a DH ideally for someone, but i cant even imagine what he’d do to the short porch in RF for 81 games.
“My bad. I may have been confusing you with Betsy, who I? believe was arguing against the idea of using Hughes as the centerpiece of an offer for Peavy. Sorry about that.”
No biggie.
“Your points about the poverty in the organization about coaching and player development are all very good ones. And I agree. We may differ on this but that is really an ownership issue.”
sj44 has mentioned this ownership problem too.i don’t have any connections inside the yankee minor league system anymore so i don’t know what goes on there. i’m just going by results i see namely the players coming out of the system.
so what you are saying is that ownership is on board for 200 million for players, but doesn’t spend the money on coaches and management at the minor league level?
if that’s the case why is cashman trying to develop his own minor league players. wouldn’t it be better to trade for tampa or minnesota young players who are developed properly.
it seems cashman should be fighting tooth and nail with ownership to get positions filled at the minor league level to implement his youth plan. as it is, he’s drafting good young players who will be poorly developed. what’s the sense in that?
isn’t this just another bad plan of his that makes no sense since he doesn’t have ownership backing?
Imagine a team with Texas’s starting pitching, Toronto’s offense, the Mets bullpen, the Brewers’ infield defense and the Yankees outfield defense.
How many games does this team lose?
the Brewers are playing some bad defense.
“but i cant even imagine what he’d do to the short porch in RF for 81 games.”
They have short porches to every field in Philly.
Rebeca – losing 100+ games? lol
Is Jody Gerut a FA this offseason you know for a stop gap OF
“Howard also strikes out a heck of a lot.”
Does he ever! He strikes out once every 3 at bats.
But there seems to be this love affair with Xavier Nady here,a player who strikes out once every 4 at bats.
I’m having a hard time imagining just how bad an outfield that sports Brett Gardner and his .283 obp and Nady with his .320 obp can be be. It certainly has the potential to be the worst in the AL East.
I’d rather sign Griffey, Edmonds, or Burrell for CF than a stop gap
AP: then what do you do when Jackson is ready?
Damon-Gardner-Nady would not only be the worst offensive outfield in baseball, but will be near the bottom defensively too. Nady is a hideous right fielder. Damon is average at best. None of the 3 have much of an arm.
If Cashman really thinks that OF would get it done in the AL East, he is in for a rude awakening.
And this is the guy we want playing our center field?
Okay, okay, small sample size, but still…
Phillies up 2-0
That’s the hardest play for a CF to make…the one hit right at you on a line…
As good as Howard is, his low BA really hurts. Looking solely at offensive production this year, there are at least five 1B that did better than Howard. Those guys would be Albert Pujols, Lance Berkman, Miguel Cabrera, Kevin Youkilis, and Mark Teixeira.
Ryan Howard not even getting anything to hit, the book on him w/ RISP is out.
Randy,
The ML payroll with the Yankees doesn’t necessarily compute to logic when it comes to other expenditures throughout the organization. That’s the battle Cash fights everyday.
If he left, the new GM, whomever that would have been, would have the same fight on his hands.
It wasn’t that long ago that George, off a bad post-season, decided the take away the medical and dental benefits of the staffers because it was “too expensive”. Hal, not even involved in the organization at the time, stopped George was doing it, knowing that it was the wrong thing to do.
They lost Gil Patterson because of money and that ticked off Cash to no end.
One reason why he was on the fence about coming back was this issue.
Hank? Hank can be controlled. He is his father’s son when it comes to popping off. In the grand scheme of things, its like a mosquito bite.
Irritating but not life threatening.
Forcing the organization to ante up for better coaches and scouts is another story. That’s where Hal comes in since the buck stops with him.
JMO but, I believe Hal will loosen up the purse strings in that area.
I say that because if he was unwilling to do so, Cash wasn’t coming back.
This is a brave, new world for the Yankees. Its why I’ve said this path is the correct one to take but, the execution of it has to improve.
By the time the industry goes to Vegas for the Winter Meetings, we will probably get a better idea of how things are going. That’s a lot like a job fair for the industry.
That’s when they will probably add more people to the operation at the minor league level.
“I’d rather sign Griffey, Edmonds, or Burrell for CF than a stop gap”
You mean Jerry Mumphrey’s not available????
Let him take over in left when Damon walks. Chances are Cashman won’t give Nady the money Boras will demand either.
We still need 3 OFers by the end of next year and we only have one in our system who is any good.
“Damon-Gardner-Nady would not only be the worst offensive outfield in baseball, but will be near the bottom defensively too.”
Truer words you wont find.
Camron is awful, i thought he was supposed to be a defensive magician in the OF?
“Those guys would be Albert Pujols, Lance Berkman, Miguel Cabrera, Kevin Youkilis, and Mark Teixeira.”
and conveniently enough, Teixeira is available this offseason, and for only $$, no tradeable prospects needed.
Odessy,
Damon has above average range in LF but his arm brings him down to being about an average LF. Gardner is above average in LF. Nady is solidly average, certainly not hideous.
The outfield defense would be okay if those were the three starters. Simply replacing Abreu with Nady gives the defense a huge improvement over this year.
The infield is another matter. Jeter will probably regress to being below average once again. A-rod will continue being slightly below average. Hopefully Cano can return to being an above average 2B and the hopefully the Yankees can get an above average fielding 1B to replace Giambi.
I think there are some opportunities to improve the defense. Most notably, replacing Giambi and Abreu. Also its very reasonable to expect Cano to rebound.
Gallardo has been betrayed by his defense this inning…that was a good 3-2 pitch to Burrell…not he’s need a Houdini performance to get out of it…
I’d rather sign Griffey, Edmonds, or Burrell for CF than a stop gap
That stop gap after the AS break … .323/.358/.638
Well, that’s a *little* better than Nady-Damon-Abreu.
I think we all know that Nady’s not in our long-term plans. Let’s enjoy him while he’s here.
You need role players with talent like Pedroia, Youkallis, and Lowell. The latter two have been 100 RBI guys who play GG defense and hit .300. The former is going to win the MVP this year. All are great OBP guys.
Role player shouldn’t be code word for guys that can’t hit but have some mythical ‘intangibles’.
Oy Gallardo….
How are the Phillies able to layoff that curveball?
Camron is awful, i thought he was supposed to be a defensive magician in the OF?
It was a hard straight LD have you ever played CF before ?
Now that’s the CF we want.
“and conveniently enough, Teixeira is available this offseason, and for only $$, no tradeable prospects needed.”
REALLY!?! I hadn’t heard that he was going to be a free agent!!!
Ryan Howard seems to hit an awful lot of HRs to the opposite field. What happens when his first 3 or 4 shots to left center are easy outs in YS? He starts doing exactly what Giambi did. Pull everything, because it takes your best shot and then some to beat LC in Yankee Stadium. Then that .245 goes to .215. Giambi was an all fields hitter at @.320-.340 in Oakland. Dead pull, .248 in pinstripes. Juice, and the age had their effects as well, but he was trying to pull the ball to right the second he walked through the door.
How are the Phillies able to layoff that curveball?
Confidence, last year they were rookies and now it looks like they are getting use to the stage.
I did just listen to Brian Cashman with Francessa. First I thought it was going to be a very uncomfortable listen, but it ended up being one of the best interviews I’ve heard from Francessa, and Cashman, too, for that matter.
We need more good looking players like Nady.
Enough with guys like Ponson, Abreu, Matsui, Randy Johnson, Alfred E. Kennedy etc.
Haha calling Youkilis, Pedroia and Lowell “role players”. Yeah, they play the role of being legitimiate/deserving allstars.
Sad that Victorino had more plate discipline in that bat than A-Rod would have.
We need more good looking players like Nady.
IDGAF how they look ! he could be Sam Cassell for all I care, just be useful.
No CC scoops yet here in Vallejo, but I’m keeping my eyes open.
Just flipped on the Phillies game on the radio and guess who’s doing the play-by-play. Yup, our pal Michael Kay. And guess who’s doing the color. Yup, our pal Steve Phillips. It’s a dream team!
Weather Man…:) lol
Brewers and the Chi Sox are teams we should stay away from modeling ourselves after… bad defense, sluggers, lots of Ks, no speed, mediocre pitching, no bullpen etc. Though the Brewers are the young version of that whereas the Chi Sox are the older version of that.
We need to emulate the Twins and Marlins.
Hey Patrick, as far as I know, you’re the only person who joined me in the Moose #20 Moose Bar pledge. Still on board?
O_O;; Holy Cole Hamels.
Just looking at Hamels career…and Smoltz just mentioned…40-50 inning increase every year…
Just like young pitchers should be brought along…
Well at least Cash can start working on CC next week. Seems hes about to have alot of free time.
Didn’t the Twins and Marlins miss the playoffs again this year, with not much outlook for next year?
Xavier Nady biggest asset to the Yankees will be as a trading chip. His 75 games with Pittsburgh this year wildly surpassed his career performance.
I truly hope Cashman doesnt get suckered into thinking Nady is even close to being an offensive replacement for Abreu. There is no comparison. for a team that struggled to score runs, they can’t afford to diminish their offense further.
I think the “All-Star at every position thing” just isn’t working. Chemistry wins titles, so does youth. So I think Abreau/Giambi have to go for change-for-change-sake reasons. I’d put someone that could be got easily with a solid glove, decent bat at first – Kotchman, Overbay – a lefty like that. Gonzales would be OK, but he might come at a steep cost (assuming San Diego would trade him). That person is a placeholder for when Posada has to move over there in 2010.
Then I’d go after one of the young L.A. outfielders: Either or Kemp. I like Either better (lefty), but either or. I would think Cano would have to be involved in any trade there. So be it. Maybe sign Orlando Hudson as a free agent.
I like the bullpen – and I don’t know about Sabathia. That’s a lot of innings the last two years… I also wouldn’t trade Hughes (unless Santana’s available again. hah.).
So my lineup would be:
Damon
Either
Jeter
A-Rod
Posada
Matsui
Nady
Hudson
Kotchman
- Maybe flip Hudson & Either
- Gardner on bench, sharing time with Damon
- Molina as backup catcher
Pitchers:
Chamberlain, Wang, free agent, Hughes, Pettitte
- I assume Mussina will retire
C’mon…you are ready to give the Phillies the series after 3.5 innings…
When does FA period begin? Isn’t it 15 days after the WS ends?
You know who had a bad year, the Tigres and the Injuns. People are still projecting Cleveland to do well next season. Am I missing something?
I don’t mind an all-star at every position if it’s a 2009 all-star. 2001 all-stars didn’t get the job done.
The Red Sox don’t have “role players”. Their entire lineup basically made the All-Star team.
That term is used too loosely. Find some players who hit in the clutch, play good defense, with high OBP. That is what winning teams are made of, not players like Gardner who hit .230 and can’t get the ball out of the infield. You can find players with talent and clutchness you know, those terms don’t have to be mutually exclusive.
Dropping baseballs makes me sad.
Fredo,
So Peavy’s National League work doesn’t translate to the AL but Phil Hughes’ INTERnational League work does??? Is that what I’m to understand???
Couldn’t agree more…… I don’t understand people’s aversion to NL pitchers. OK, so their stats probably won’t be as good, but are the Yanks supposed to turn their backs if pitchers like Webb, Peavey, Volquez, Cain, Lincecum, etc. were to become available for whatever reason in a trade? We can’t possibly want any of them because, OMG, they’re NL pitchers.
Holy crap StEve dA kOoKy MeTs faN actually made sense w/ a trade !
I would love to see the Brewers win. The Phils have some postseason experience on their side.
Oh well.
GO ANGELS!
(I just can’t say it enough!!!)
mel: Indians were way bit by injuries this year. If they’re healthy, they’re dangerous.
“Obviously he did not address the future of specific players, especially those FAs from outside the organization. But he warned fans against expecting the Yankees to get certain players. That means CC Sabathia.”
So this is how Pete defines “defiant” and “fiesty” he is basically saying we will not be doing what it takes to get the only free agent who is an absolute must. I cannot believe this clown got 3 more years I really hope the organization overrules him and the Yanks go after CC. You’d think after souring the Yankees on Santana last off-season and watching IPK and Hughes blow up in his face this season it would be in his best interest to attempt to land the best pitcher in baseball who is a free agent. What an inept moron. He chased down Pavano to give him 40 million and Igawa for even more but he wont attempt to spend the Yankees money on a pitcher 100 times more talented than either of the aforementioned players.
who has a link to the moose bars order site?
when i google “moose bars” i get an entry from Rebecca’s blog. and some bars (booze, not chocolate).
Brandon: Que dijo?
Whats so special about Nady?
- Low OBP
- Average defense at best
- .260-.275 average hitter]
- No speed
- Alarming K rates
So he might hit 20 HRs, what else does he provide exactly that makes him worth the contract extension he will demand?
As I listened to Brian Cashman, I got the impression that none of the Yankees outfielders are guaranteed a job next season. Perhaps Damon, but while he said he liked Nady, he seemed to be saying if a move comes along that makes sense for them, Nady could be a piece. Doesn’t sound like he’s sold on Gardner as everyday, but a good player off the bench, and Melky right now is in play because he’s theirs right now.
I think right now the Yankees have an empty outfield and no first baseman. They may end up with people they currently have, but they just as well might not. They also have 3 open positions in the rotation. That’s a lot to fill.
Jeez, I thought Howard was a big kid. He looks like Kate Moss compared to Fielder.
Yeah, I agree that while NL may have much less talent, it is still really tough. The argument that NL pitchers can’t hack in the AL would imply that AL pitchers will always improve in the NL. This has not been the case, e.g. Zito (much worse), Santana (the same). Era’s may change from league to league, but 20 wins is just as difficult in each league, and at the end of the day a W is all that matters.
Rebecca he said Jonathon Niese for Daniel Cabrera ofcourse Baltimore would have to pick up the option first and pay Danny..but I was holy sh** he made some sense !
Sabathia-Myers is intriguing tomorrow.
This will be CC’s 4th consecutive start on 3 days rest. He is pitching in a bandbox against a good lineup.
Myers had a couple of rough starts lately but has been lights out since the ASB. Kind of like Burnett– nasty stuff but can’t harness it all the time.
But back to CC— how many more starts can he go on 3 days rest? Tomorrow will be his 4th.
“Jeez, I thought Howard was a big kid. He looks like Kate Moss compared to Fielder.”
Prince is a tub.
Good points, LLIME. It is so much easier to be a good team when your clutch players are also your stars. However, most championship teams do have those second and third tier players who have a great clutch year. The great teams of the ’90s had that, the ‘86 Mets had Ray Knight who seemed to get the big hit every night. The Yankees haven’t really had much of that recently. ARod had that kind of year last year, but not in the playoffs, and the rest of the team was too flawed to fill the void when he wasn’t hitting.
“Their entire lineup basically made the All-Star team. ”
What kind of contract you think they will give Varitek this off season after coming off his allstar year? 4/55mil? I wonder if he will get any MVP votes.
“As I listened to Brian Cashman, I got the impression that none of the Yankees outfielders are guaranteed a job next season. Perhaps Damon, but while he said he liked Nady, he seemed to be saying if a move comes along that makes sense for them, Nady could be a piece. Doesn’t sound like he’s sold on Gardner as everyday, but a good player off the bench, and Melky right now is in play because he’s theirs right now.
I think right now the Yankees have an empty outfield and no first baseman. They may end up with people they currently have, but they just as well might not. They also have 3 open positions in the rotation. That’s a lot to fill.”
Doreen I agree with your listen. Cashman wasn’t entirely nebulous but he certainly wasn’t confirmational in terms of player guarantees.
It will be an interesting watch.
If the Yankees are turning abreu and Giambi loose, there’s no way that they are going to move Cano. That leaves them completely void of left handed power on the big team and very little left handed power in the minors. They are moving into a park that, like the old YS is conducive to having a fair share of left handed power.
Brandon: that’s not actually a horrible idea!
Great… another average lefty going to Baltimore’s rotation, we know what that means.
In a series, they can now throw out Garrett Olsen, Brian Burress, and now Jon Niese?
We may set records for fewest hits in a series.
Al,
Feisty because of his tone and some of the things he said. For instance, he clearly said he didn’t like some of the things he read in the papers.
Defiant because he wasn’t going to be run out of town by the job, the conditions, the whatever.
And he refused to second guess passing on Santana. Clearly he wanted to keep the “inventory” and go for a pitcher in FA.
Sign Big Tex
7 years/$150 million.
Full NTC
Private suits on road
Incentives for making the ASG, GG, MVP etc.
vtred: It was a trade suggestion, not an actual trade.
“Hey Patrick, as far as I know, you’re the only person who joined me in the Moose #20 Moose Bar pledge. Still on board?”
Sure, whats the link again? I agreed to buy a box right?
Al from BK -
If you can, listen to Cashman’s PC. He did not say the Yankees wouldn’t try to get CC. He did say you can only do so much. I got the impression the early take is that CC is not all that interested in coming here. Contrary to what people like to think, it is NOT always the money alone.
“Incentives for making the ASG, GG, MVP etc”
Yes, because for just 150M, you can’t expect the guy to make the All-Star game too.
Hamels missed on location there…and viola liner to RF
Doreen: I think you have a good take on it.
Let’s not get all ridiculous on the what a saint he’s gone on 3 days rest thing.
Smoltz told Dan Patrick that it’s easier to go on 3 days rest, than 4.
“What’s the diffenrece between three and four days rest? Smoltzy thinks a pitcher is fresher on three days rest because he doesn’t have to throw on the side and can keep up momentum instead of having to sit and watch for four days.”
Of course if you go 4X in 12 days, that’s OMG what a saint.
Trish -
Yes, this is warming up to be a sizzling hot stove season!
Hamels putting on a clinic….inside…outside…fastball…change-up
This is really a great pitching performance…
“Al,
Feisty because of his tone and some of the things he said. For instance, he clearly said he didn’t like some of the things he read in the papers.
Defiant because he wasn’t going to be run out of town by the job, the conditions, the whatever.
And he refused to second guess passing on Santana. Clearly he wanted to keep the “inventory†and go for a pitcher in FA.”
I just think its ridiculous that he is taking a victims stance when he is the one who discouraged the Santana deal. Now he is trying to discourage us on CC, its not going to happen. Obviously he wasn’t watching both Darrel Rasner and Ponson make 15 plus starts each for this team this year. That is not acceptable for Yankee team to have over 1/4 of the teams games started bu=y AAAA pitchers. This guy needs to get a lesson on priorities.
“So Nady might hit 20 HRs, what else does he provide exactly that makes him worth the contract extension he will demand?”
Have you noticed that he’s EXTREMELY good looking??!!
Sorry, I couldn’t resist.
Seriously, as gorgeous as Nady is, he is just an average ballplayer. He’s slow in the field and I think his hitting is exaggerated this year as well. If given the choice, I’d keep Abreu and deal Nady.
Laura,
If Abreu was 3 years younger, I’d do the same thing. But he’s not.
And the only grass that Abreu should see is in the pasture. Seriously. I don’t need stats to tell me what I saw.
I’m still puzzled why we traded a 5 tool stud like Tabata for 1.5 years of Nady. We were not expected to contend this year anyway. That was exactly the type of quick fix Cash was trying to stay away from.
I was hoping that Pete would explain the below sentence that he wrote from Cashman’s press conference, but he hasn’t {Pete has been cuddling up to Cash lately} – that’s a joke Pete. I would love to know which moves he wasn’t involved in and regrets from last off season. This is what he said: Cashman said that relations between he and the Steinbrenners have improved since last winter when some moves were made he did not approve of.
Didn’t Nady get a ton of big hits, or was I seeing things? Isn’t that what we have been looking for?
But, he does need to lay off the high fastball, pitchers will exploit that to death next year if he doesn’t.
Wasn’t Gallardo right there with Hughes and Baily for the top prospect in baseball a couple of years ago?
He had a great rookie year last year.
“This is a brave, new world for the Yankees. Its why I’ve said this path is the correct one to take but, the execution of it has to improve.”
this isn’t a flashy subject like trading for free agents or even in developing a joba type player, but right now is the time to revamp the minor system if you’re going to do it. coaches contracts are up all over baseball.
i know the dodgers earlier this year hired four traveling minor league hitting coaches to implement torre’s theory of hitting throughout the organization. gene clines was one of those hired to do this. who’s gene clines? he was griffey’s, then bonds, and then sosa’a hitting coach at seattle ,san francisco, and chicago. a former starting member of the “we are family pirates”, clines is as good a hitting coach as there is. and torre went out and got him in his organization.
cashman really needs to be grabbing guys like this while they are contract free. the good ones aren’t likely going to be free as late as the winter meetings.
i see what you and cb are saying, but i’m not optimistic cashman is reacting fast enough to make a dramatic difference in the minor league system to provide a solid basis for his plan to work.
i just read an article on stan cliburn, the twins triple a manager, going to the arizona fall league and having half a dozen twins prospects under his tutelage. what will be happening is these players will be further exposed the the twins way of playing baseball. cliburn is as good a teacher as there is. he’s going to have these players next year or the next on their way to the bigs. the twins do this stuff in a very consistent way. when a twins player reaches the majors he knows many friedly faces in the clubhouse and he plays the same way that major league clubhouse plays.
the yankees need to get this same type of system, or else forget it and just buy players.if they are not going to do it right at the minor league level, they’d be better not even trying. just my opinion.
“Al from BK -
If you can, listen to Cashman’s PC. He did not say the Yankees wouldn’t try to get CC. He did say you can only do so much. I got the impression the early take is that CC is not all that interested in coming here. Contrary to what people like to think, it is NOT always the money alone.”
I just disagree with his delivery. You cannot enter the off-season with a defeated attitude. The fact is nobody has talked to CC yet so until someone does its silly to try to temper expectations because of hear-say.
Sorry Al. Didn’t get any feeling at all that Cashman was playing a victim. He did not apologize for his decisions last winter. And he did not say they were not going to make a go at CC, but that it needs to be understood that sometimes you don’t get what you want.
“Defiant Cashman returns, vowing change”
Barack Cashman?
“If Abreu was 3 years younger, I’d do the same thing. But he’s not.
And the only grass that Abreu should see is in the pasture. Seriously. I don’t need stats to tell me what I saw.”
mel, you know that I’m not going to tell you that Abreu plays a great RF. And yes, he’s closer to 40 than he is to 30. I still think that, even at his “old” age, he has more potential than Nady does. Believe me, I don’t want to lose Nady (for reasons that have nothing to do with baseball – Heeheehee!), but Cash made it clear today that they are revamping the OF and no one has a guaranteed spot. If I’m reshuffling the deck, I put Damon in LF, Gardner in CF and Abreu in RF with Matsui acting as perm DH.
Brandon,
That had to be an imposter. There’s no way the real Steve would make such a reasonable trade proposal.
The real Steve would have suggested Castillo, Schenweiss, and Heilman for Peavy.
Because of Hank and his impatience and other bad qualities the Yanks bid against themselves on Afraud and now have a 10 yr deal with the small man Arod.
Cashman would have never gone more then 7 years which to me was way to much already.
Lock Hank in the closet and let Cashman do his job..
plus nady is RH, which is a plus.
Also, let’s see how CC does tomorrow, 3 days rest or not. He was not so hot last year in the playoffs, lest we forget. And the natives (in NY) get pretty restless when their brand new toys don’t perform the way they expect. CC may not be the perfect guy.
Can we have a rule that anyone who suggests Posada to 1B is banned for 30 days or longer. Have we not yet seen enough ecidence that a make believe 1B affects all the other infielders and the pitching staff? If Jorge is physically unable to catch (knees or shoulder) he won’t be physically able to play 1B either!!!
Jorge will catch and/or DH, dassitt
Kotchman, Howard and Gonzales are not going to be traded without giving up an awful lot. The realistic 1B options are an older guy to share the position with Miranda (Blake? Millar?) or sign Teixiera. Trying to survive with Nady, Matsui or Damon is also an option, but if they decide to do that — and I hope they don’t — get Mientkiewicz for late inning defense.
People ask about role players… they are guys who can start 1/3 of the time and help you in multiple ways off the bench. Jason Michaels and Frank Catalanotto are two of my personal favorites. Chad Curtis was a pretty good one. Miguel Cairo too. Yanks need a couple of those in ‘09.
laura – great suggestion for reshuffling the deck, insofar as reshuffling the deck means you keep it exactly the way it was for the last part of the season.
Mark: LMAO! Are we supposed to read something into that?
“Wilson
October 1st, 2008 at 3:29 pm
Didn’t somebody compare Clippard with Peavy last year
Peavey to Clippard? No
Kennedy to Clippard? we have a match.
“Didn’t Nady get a ton of big hits, or was I seeing things? Isn’t that what we have been looking for?”
Yes and so has Abreu. Abreu walks more than Nady, he steals bases (not as often as he used to) and Alex likes hitting behind him. These all work in his favor.
86w–Catchers have to throw in a way that first basemen usually don’t, and because it’s posada’s throwing shoulder that’s a concern, it’s a legitimate issue.
Abreu hits for a higher average than Nady
Abreu has comparable HR power to Nady
Abreu has more doubles/triples than Nady
Abreu has far more speed than Nady
Abreu has a higher OBP, OPS, SLG than Nady
Abreu strikes out less than Nady
Abreu sees more pitches per AB and is more patient than Nady
Abreu is a better clutch hitter (though both are good in those situations, Abreu is more of a threat)
Nady has only two things on Abreu-
Looks and plays a slightly better RF.
have to love the Miller Highlight commercials. Ostrich??@!
“great suggestion for reshuffling the deck, insofar as reshuffling the deck means you keep it exactly the way it was for the last part of the season.”
Nady has been in LF since the trade in July and Gardner only played CF on a regular basis the last couple of weeks of the season. As such, the deck has been shuffled.
Aye…it must be playoff time…endless Frank TV commercials.
Nobody’s saying Nady’s better than Abreu.
Abreu’s not an option if he wants a 3 year deal.
That’s all.
Moose Bar site:
http://sweetshoppe.wolfgangcan.....roductName
I think the ‘challenge’ was to pledge to buy a case, or maybe that was just what I promised. Case, box, it’s all for the kids!
“Nady has only two things on Abreu- Looks and plays a slightly better RF.”
Maybe MLB should invent a new stat based on looks. How many female fans they make swoon per at bat.
Rebecca,
No, as long as he doesn’t promise everybody the world, and then find out later he has neither the money nor the ability to deliver on any of his empty promises.:)
Okay I’ll buy a case. I’ll post pictures when it arrives.
“We were not expected to contend this year anyway”
thats news to me
vtred
Jeter’s wrist says do the deal.
Abreu will get the Yanks a 1st round pick and a supplemental 1st round pick. He is history at this point. They do NOT need to have a RF on the downside who is scared to run near a wall making $16MM a year for the next 3 years or until he is 38 years old. Smarter ways to spend that money along with smarter ways to spend the money on savings from Giambi, Petitte, Mussina {1 year wonder} and Pavano – Total savings $80MM {Plus get maybe 7 top picks also}. $’s to be spent on younger players. Maybe just 3 – CC, Lowe and Tex would cost $60MM a year combined and you still have $20MM left. Who can argue with that!
Every pitcher faces situations like this at least once in a game…
Aces work out of it…let’s see what Hamels can do…
Oddessy,
Abreu is old. He is declining. He hits between two future HOF. He wants a multi year deal. Not happening. They will offer him arb and if he takes it theyll take him back for a year but no way are we taking a multi year on another old player who cannot play his position well.
Change-up deadly…
Hamels = ace.
Wow…nice job by Hamels…
I’ve gone on record saying that I can part with Abreu if we get a big bat at 1B. But his production HAS TO BE REPLACED if we let him walk. It’s as simple as that.
It’s simple they offer Arbreu arbitration – he accepts they sign him at $16MM – he won’t win more. If he refuses he signs elsewhere and the Yanks get 2 top picks. No lose situation. Even Cash can’t screw that up!
“Abreu’s not an option if he wants a 3 year deal.”
Could not agree more.
“Nobody’s saying Nady’s better than Abreu.”
Thank god. I was beginning to think that Nady’s good looks were getting in the way of logic with a lot of folks lol.
I don’t know how many folks here remember Jerry Kenney from the late 60’s – early 70’s. Brett Gardner is Jerry Kenney, an over hyped speedster that can’t hit a lick.
The difference between them is that Kenney knew how to take a walk. Gardner, on the other hand, has yet to play a professional season where he didnt strike out more times than walk.
Offensively, Brett Gardner makes Melky look like Mantle. With Gardner as the possible stater, the pressure on Austin Jackson to develop into a legitimate major league center fielder is enormous. It will be interesting to see what happens if he has a great Spring Training. Will the Yanks give him a chance at making the ‘09 roster?
Tabata a 5 tool stud?
Do you know what determines a 5 tool player? Ability to hit, defend, run, throw, and hit for power. All of those “tools” have to be done above average for him to be called a, “5 tool player”.
Have you ever watched Jose Tabata play? If you have, you wouldn’t be calling him a, “5 tool stud” because he is not.
There isn’t a single talent evaluator in the game who classifies him as a 5 tool player right now.
He is an average defender. Had a below average year in the OF this season. Overall though, he’s an average defender and I suspect he will be that next season.
He has an above average arm. That’s one tool. He can really throw the ball and is pretty accurate with his arm for a young kid.
He used to be a good hitter. He has struggled to find his stroke in AA. I think he is a better hitter than he showed this year. However, he has a ways to go to get back to saying without any doubt he will hit at the higher levels of play.
He has little power.
He doesn’t have much speed. In fact, I would say he is an average baserunner with below average speed.
Before folks talk about his wrist surgery, it was a minor operation. In fact, removing the hamate bone should INCREASE, not DECREASE his bat speed. His bat is slower now than it was in A Ball. That’s a concern.
Perhaps if he loses some weight he can get back to what he was in A Ball. He played most of this season about 15 pounds over what he should be at this point in his career.
Its going to be interesting to see how he plays in the Pirates organization. On the one hand, there is less pressure. On the other hand, the Pirates are known throughout the game as having the worst minor league instructors, managers and coaches in baseball. Its a wasteland for guys trying to grow as young players.
For a kid like Tabata, who needs a lot of instruction, that’s a concern.
Drive, the worst thing the Yankees can do is rush Jackson into the majors in Spring 09.
Laura,
How about we replace Abreu’s defense (which was horrendous) with Nady’s? Healthy Matsui, healthy Posada, full year of Nady at the plate and Cano having a normal year would also replace Abreu’s offense.
Also whoever the Yankees get at first base will be an average or above average hitter.
The Yankees can change their philosophy from being a slugging team to being a team that focuses on situational hitting, defense and pitching. Thats where the league is trending nowadays anyways.
Heck I’d love Teixeira (or another slugger) but if they don’t get him its not the end of the world.
thanks for the link Nick
“Maybe MLB should invent a new stat based on looks. How many female fans they make swoon per at bat.”
well, it would help fill seats, if anything. i find it hard to believe as many women would like baseball if, as Brandon suggested, everyone looked like Sam Cassell…
“Laura
October 1st, 2008 at 4:44 pm
I’ve gone on record saying that I can part with Abreu if we get a big bat at 1B. But his production HAS TO BE REPLACED if we let him walk. It’s as simple as that”
actually, you right.
even if +++ upgrades to pitching staff, happen. Hopefully, Cashman will be creative.
Drive 4-5,
I don’t know a lot, but they’re not going to give the job to a kid in AA no matter what kind of ST he has.
To be fair SJ, Tabata flourished after he was traded. That is definitely a positive sign for his development. I think he will be a successful major leaguer some day but he certainly isn’t a 5 tool player.
I’m insulted.
Though probably not as insulted as Sam Cassell.
saucY,
If you fielded a team of Sam Cassells, even the men wouldn’t watch. Hide the kids and children ugly.
We would all be listening to Sterling & Suzyn. Think War of the Worlds.
Rebecca,
I agree. But you wonder what would happen if he had a great Spring Training. They may have to make a decision between going with a far inferior ( in comparison to the rest of the AL) player at a crucial position or taking a chance on rushing AJ.
This Traveler’s guy with the big umbrella is just creepy! Especially when he has the kids riding in the umbrella.
Well, Tabata failed at the 6th tool. Attitude. I know he was trying to do well, but you don’t walk out of the clubhouse.
Did Ryan Howard seriously just play defense
I gotta go off and learn about medieval nobility. Will be back in time to hear that the bailout failed again and to watch the Angels tan it against the Sox, just to torment us
Brewers have somewhere to go?
All things considered, the Yankees had a decent pitching staff. Most of the key points in the season where the team failed, it seemd that it was the offense more than the pitching staff. If they can get moose or a healthy pettite back next season their rotation would look like this: Wang, Moose (maybe), Chamberlin, Pettite and Hughes. If moose doesn’t come back Pettite would go second and Aceves would take his spot. If Pettite doesn’t come back a free agent along the lines of Perez would sufice. If they get a big name pitcher like Sabbathia good for them, but they don’t need a lot of pitching help. They really need a good clutch hitter (cough…Texiera) to mesh with the Nady and protect A-Rod. keeping Abreu would also be nice. Damon-CF, Jeter, Abreu-RF, Rodriguez, Texiera, Nady-LF, Posada, Cano. But if they can’t: Damon-LF, Jeter, Nady-RF,A-Rod, Tex, Jorge, Matsui, Cano, Gardner-CF. I think either of those lineups would be formitible and be a good formula for success or at least another AL east title.
Cole Hamels is sick, he’s throwing a fantastic game right now.
When did the whole Peavy thing catch on ?
did ya’ll make this up…or is there ACTUAL evidence behind it ?
A lineup of
Damon
Jeter
Matsui
Arod
Posada
1B (Miranda, Kotchman,)
Nady
Cano
Gardner
will be average at best offensively. Heck, the lineup with Abreu and Giambi in it finished 7th in the league in runs. Subtract those 50 HRs/200 RBIs and it will get even worse. Don’t bring up Posada, he is a .277 career hitter who had an aberration year. His void was missed more in the clubhouse anyway. Matsui is always injured and isin;t even close to what he was pre-wrist injury.
I have no problem letting Abreu walk and getting younger, but you need to get comparable talent. Be willing to be creative for a trade and willing to give up some good prospects.
Phelps Phan: per Buster Onley this morning, SD is said to make him available.
Patrick,
A 40+ AB sample size isn’t necessarily flourishing. It could just be a hot streak. We don’t know yet.
Its going to be interesting to see how it shakes out with him.
He didn’t just fall out of favor with the Yankees. A lot of scouts I know really soured on the kid this year.
Not because of attitude either. They just didn’t see the skill they saw a few years back and the weight gain really concerned them.
With a lot of young guys built like Tabata, if they can’t control their weight now, it tends to continue to rise as they get older.
I think the #1 concern going forward with him is his fitness. If he is going to keep the weight on, he’s not going to be as good as he can be, IMO.
I really hope the kid turns it around because he is a nice kid.
The Pirates? Man, that’s a BAD organization at the minor league level. He’s going to have to be a self starter for it to work for him there, IMO.
When it comes to re-tooling the team, in particular the offense, its not about matching player production stat for stat with their replacements.
Its about improving the overall TEAM. Perhaps, they become more flexible offensively. Perhaps, the pitching and defense allows the offense to relax more and they become more productive.
Perhaps, Arod and Cano have bounceback years, while Matsui, Jeter, and Posada are healthy and productive over a full season.
If those things occur, the offense is automatically better, even if they don’t get similar production from RF or 1B.
Hamels is a stud.
Too bad, the Brewers would be down by a run if not tied at 0 if they played defense. But thats the name of the game. Nobody felt sorry for us when Sheff and Crosby collided in the OF in Anaheim allowing 2 runs to score.
“The Yankees can change their philosophy from being a slugging team to being a team that focuses on situational hitting, defense and pitching. Thats where the league is trending nowadays anyways.
Heck I’d love Teixeira (or another slugger) but if they don’t get him its not the end of the world.”
The key is pitching. I posted the other day that if we don’t get some top of the line pitching, we are going to have to remain a slugging team. If your starters are going to be giving up 5-6 runs a game, you better be prepared to score 8-9 runs. That is what doomed us this year. We had crappy pitching, the hitters felt pressured to try and overcome that lousy pitching, they pressed at the plate and did horribly because of it.
I’m prepared to go the non slugging route, but not without at least 3 studs on the mound.
Went out to walk the dog and missed a whole inning? What was that an 8 pitch inning for Hamels….wow
Fatcessa arguing that Santana is leaps and bounds better than Sabathia. Gee whiz someone has a man crush. Johan and his 91 mph fastball is still way better than CC who is a machine.
That guy who said Hamels changeup was an 80 like Santana wasn’t kidding. I’ve heard it was good but damn, I never knew it was this good.
Can we trade Ian for Cole?
And Bill Madden is the special guest on SNY now.
Looks like I won’t be tuning in
LINK TO FRANCESA INTERVIEW WITH CASHMAN – IMPORTANT TO LISTEN: http://www.wfan.com/topic/play.....topic=true
He’s nuts.
Sabathia carried two teams on his back to the playoffs in back to back years.
Johan didn’t carry the Mets to the playoffs.
Before folks talk about the Mets bullpen woes, check out the Brewers bullpen.
Eric Gagne and Salomon Torres on the back end. Not exactly inspriring.
Johan is a great pitcher but, what CC has done the last two years is amazing.
To say Johan is leaps and bounds better than CC is moronic.
Then again, its Mike Francesa. The football “expert” who declared Eli Manning a “bust” after 4 weeks of the football season last year.
NOT very funny…
2nd web gem for Utley. Fabulous play.
A lot of posts on here drooling over getting Derek Lowe? Why? Is it based on what he’s done in a weak hitting division full of pitchers ballparks? Or is it based on what he did 5-6 years ago when he was 30?
“The key is pitching. I posted the other day that if we don’t get some top of the line pitching, we are going to have to remain a slugging team. If your starters are going to be giving up 5-6 runs a game, you better be prepared to score 8-9 runs. That is what doomed us this year. We had crappy pitching, the hitters felt pressured to try and overcome that lousy pitching, they pressed at the plate and did horribly because of it.”
That is what has separated us from the Red Sox the past 4 years. Pitching in 04 the Sox had Pedro, Schilling, Lowe 3 front end guys in their rotation. The past few years they’ve had Beckett, Lester, Matsuzaka. The Yankees over those years have had a washed up Clemens, older Pettitte, one good year from Moose preceded by 2 mediocre years and Wang thats the reason why we haven’t won since 04 its not a curse its a heinous lack of pitching.
There is no doubt that Cashman will restore order in Yankees Universe. He is going to go all out this off-season. The NY Yankees will be back and better than ever in ‘09.
Just my 2 cents…
Kevin
SJ44,
Tabata played 22 games, 90 AB for Altoona after being traded to the Pirates. Very small sample size but its not like he went on a 1 week hot streak after he was traded. We’ll see how he does next year but it seems to me that the trade really jumpstarted Tabata.
“I’m prepared to go the non slugging route, but not without at least 3 studs on the mound.”
Yeah I agree thats why I think the Yanks should sign Burnett and Sabathia to go along with Wang and Chamberlain. Thats 4 studs in the starting rotation along with a lock down bullpen. Then go and trade for a solid CF like Mike Cameron and trade for a good 1B like Kotchman or LaRoche. I think that would be a very very good team. We’ll see though, theres a lot that can happen between now and March.
I think it’s more like a viable plan C if things don’t work out with CC or other FA pitchers.
SNY w/ the Monopoly guy, Mr.Tupee and Oh the pain is just Yankee bashing… MY GOD I HATE DNL
“A lot of posts on here drooling over getting Derek Lowe? Why? Is it based on what he’s done in a weak hitting division full of pitchers ballparks? Or is it based on what he did 5-6 years ago when he was 30?”
He is a groundball pitcher who eats innings and pitches big games. His stats wouldn’t be much different anywhere else groundball pitchers typically succeed get outs via the ground which cuts down on big hits from the opposing team.
“And Bill Madden is the special guest on SNY now.”
They should ask him what was he drinking when he wrote today’s ‘News’ article about next year’s Yankee team.
Hamels out for the 9th…probably not…right a 100 pitches…series probably going at least 4…bring in Lidge and thank Cole for a dominanting performance…
Green,
It’s based on the fact he is the best option after Sabathia and Burnett.
Dodger/Cubs next.
Over/Under on how many times Torre pinches his nose?
Oh, that’s a sign?
“The difference between them is that Kenney knew how to take a walk. Gardner, on the other hand, has yet to play a professional season where he didnt strike out more times than walk.
Offensively, Brett Gardner makes Melky look like Mantle. With Gardner as the possible stater, the pressure on Austin Jackson to develop into a legitimate major league center fielder is enormous. It will be interesting to see what happens if he has a great Spring Training. Will the Yanks give him a chance at making the ‘09 roster?”
1st..having more strike outs than walks is by no means a sign of a player who cannot succeed.
2nd..to say that gardner makes melky look like mantle is a disgrace to mantle..the 3 should never be in the same book, let alone sentence.
3rd..how can you say that gardner is inferior offensively to melky when he has less than 150 abs in mlb
4th..is melkys 8 homeruns really better than gardners ability to run and steal?
“It’s based on the fact he is the best option after Sabathia and Burnett.”
Why settle for the third best when you can get the first and second best?
Bill Madden has not written or said a reliable word in about 10 years…he’s a dinosaur…just trying to bring back his ‘Bronx Zoo’ glory days.
Funny how they asked the panel which team has the best storyline in the playoffs and Beningo was the only one who answered the question fairly. Madden/Raissmann turned it into a Girardi/Yankee bashing fest.
God, I am the biggest Cubs fans in the world for this series, get Torre out of the playoffs.
Patrick,
I agree but there is no guarentee that CC signs here or that Burnett opts out. If those 2 situations do not occur, then we are forced to turn to Lowe.
But for sure CC and Burnett are the biggest targets.
Brewers are using their BP today, planning on CC throwing a CG tomorrow regardless of score.
sorry if i insulted rebecca. and i thought it sounded better after re-wording…
Daily News Live is such a joke, biggest propaganda machine you will ever see. You know its sad when the most objective and reasonable analyst on that entire show is Beningo.
Wheelhouse with Tierney is so much better and LoudMouths is the best. Carlin is more knowledgeable than any of those Daily News Clowns (that says more about the DNL clowns rather than Carlin)
Brewers need to spin some of their position prospects at the ML level and at AA Huntsville into some pitching.
Gallardo and Parra is a nice start.
The Brewers defense is awful.
Hardy needs to move to right field
Al from BK( Brett Favre 12 TD’s 4 INT in 4 games. CC Sabathia: 17-10, 2.70 ERA, 251 K’s-253 IP, 10 CG’s 5 Shut-Outs.)
October 1st, 2008 at 5:10 pm
“A lot of posts on here drooling over getting Derek Lowe? Why? Is it based on what he’s done in a weak hitting division full of pitchers ballparks? Or is it based on what he did 5-6 years ago when he was 30?â€
He is a groundball pitcher who eats innings and pitches big games. His stats wouldn’t be much different anywhere else groundball pitchers typically succeed get outs via the ground which cuts down on big hits from the opposing team.
___________________________________________________________
Yes, and he’s going to be 36 years old, too, and will want nothing less than 3 years at 15 mil with an option year.
I threw in the contract because that seems to be the thing to do when arguing against another player. I’d prefer a pitcher that’s the same type of pitcher that throws harder in a smaller park, throws a heavy sinker and is 3-4 years younger in Ryan Dempster.
Dempster > Lowe, Perez, Sheets,
Dempster has played in bandboxes his whole career, he will be fine in YS
Whole career in the nl coming off a career year. I want no part of Ryan Dempster.
Did anyone else see that the guy who caught the 2 HR at yankee Stadium a few weeks aago caught the LAST HR ever hit at Shea on Sunday.You could not make this stuff up.
Let’s go Phils!!!
I haven’t seen any drool where Lowe is concerned… but if neither Pettite nor Mussina returns and/or Joba needs to go to the pen he might be an affordable option as a guy who eats innings.
Nady has several advantages on Abreu, actually.
He’s 4 1/2 years younger
He will cost less than half as much in ‘09.
He is a slightly better defensive OF in RF
He’s hit more HR in each of the last three seasons in fewer at bats.
Ok lets make a deal.
Lowe and Dempster face eachother tonight, whoever wins will be signed by us.
“Did anyone else see that the guy who caught the 2 HR at yankee Stadium a few weeks aago caught the LAST HR ever hit at Shea on Sunday.You could not make this stuff up.”
i read more about that kid after seeing he had 2 books and a blog about catching balls at games.
i just have to wonder how many times he cheated an actual young fan out of catching a foul ball or home run…
Well…they are gonna have to do something because right now, and according to Cashman, the Yankees have two men in the rotation…Joba and Wang…3 more holes to fill
I’d like to see Hughes a FA pitcher and then what?
But when it comes to FA pitchers there are no guarantees, even with CC, or according to most people, the 2nd coming of JC…
“Yes, and he’s going to be 36 years old, too, and will want nothing less than 3 years at 15 mil with an option year.
I threw in the contract because that seems to be the thing to do when arguing against another player. I’d prefer a pitcher that’s the same type of pitcher that throws harder in a smaller park, throws a heavy sinker and is 3-4 years younger in Ryan Dempster.”
Fair enough. I think Dempster is having a career year, but ues hes a good pitcher. In my opinion the list goes like this from most desired to least: CC Sabathia, Burnett, Lowe, Dempster.
forget dempster or lowe
if we dont sign cc then trade then farm for peavy
Sound the alarm Brad Lidge is in the playoffs.
Peavy has a no trade clause…he will decide whether or not he wants to be traded to the Yankees and not the other way around.
saucY,
I’m impressed with the statistical anomoly of him being in the vicinity of those homeruns 3 games in a row at YS. And to catch 2, and be 10 seats away on the 3rd? Wow.
And if he actually caught the last official HR at Shea. Super Wow.
not that i care buy why arent people complaining that lidge won nl comeback player of the year?..he had a mid 3 era last year….not exactly a debacle
I love the things that Austin Jackson does as much as anyone, but, for those of you that are looking for a Grady Sizemore or Torii Hunter type of power hitter, forget it. He’s a very good center fielder with a good arm….much better than Damon and a somewhat better than Gardner or Nady. If you want a comparison, he’s not quite Bernie Williams, but more along the lines of a right handed Damon or maybe a Granderson type of hitter. He’s never going to be a 100 walk guy and, yeah, he’ll strike out more than you’d want to see. He’s not the type you build a team around, but, he’s the type you can’t build without.
nice take by Braun
“If I’m reshuffling the deck, I put Damon in LF, Gardner in CF and Abreu in RF with Matsui acting as perm DH.”
I of course am down with that!
Just say NO to Lowe!!!
Finally – COME ON BREW CREW!!!
Fair ball…Durham scores
YES!!!!!
Damn Ryan Braun what a 2 strike swinger this guy is.
“Peavy has a no trade clause…he will decide whether or not he wants to be traded to the Yankees and not the other way around.”
Yeah because I’m sure Peavy would prefer finishing last in the NL West every season.
RalphieD,
I agree Melky & Gardner should never have been in the same sentance as Mantle. For that I opologize.
My point is that, at age 24, Gardner has never has anywhere near as close to as good an offensive season as Melky did in ‘06 at age 21.
“is melkys 8 homeruns really better than gardners ability to run and steal?”
You have to reach first base first.He was completely overmatched by major league pitching. You need to look no further than Kei Igawa’s success this year to see difference between minor leagues and the majors.
I love Gardner’s speed. He’s be a valuable commodity as a pinch runner/late inning defensive replacement. But that’s as far as his role should be. Brett Gardner as the starting center fielder for the New York Yankees is as out of the question as Jerry Kenney being the starting 3rd baseman was in 1969.
Well unless I’m mistaken…they won the NL West in 2005 and 2006 and came within one Rockies hot streak of winning the Wild Card in 07…hardly last place…
GB 7—-
At this age Bernie Williams had shown no power either. He hit 8 HR in Columbus at age 23.
I think Jackson with his frame could grow into a much more significant power threat. He hit 9 HR in Trendon at age 21.
Ruiz set up too early on that one…Fielder knew it would be way outside
holy crap someone tell Lidge he has a 95 mph fastball
I doubt Peavey would put up numbers anywhere close to what he does with the Padres. He is pitching in the NL west, in probably the most pitcher friendly park in the game. Adjust those numbers for the AL, and a less friendly ballpark they wouldn’t be pretty. The Yankees need to just say NO to career NL pitchers.
That was a bad pitch for Fielder to swing at…they were pitching around him…a more disciplined hitter might have realized that.
This is something that makes me proud to be a Yankee fan: We never wave towels or stuffed monkeys at any of our games.
“You have to reach first base first.He was completely overmatched by major league pitching.”
Did you not see him adjust and hit well in september. I know you dont judge on what a player does in september but because gardner was up previously, struggled and was sent down, he came back and looked much better. The stats say so.
You might want to go back and look at what Dempster did in his first years as a starter in Florida, before Baker got the smart idea to try making a relief pitcher out of him. He won 15, 13 and 10 games for Florida with 210-220 inning seasons and 200 strikeout seasons. He’s hardly a one year wonder.
Phils better get a big lead over CC tomororw as Lidge for sure wont be available throwing a ton of pitches
High drama in Philly
How can anyone judge what type of ML player someone will be after 130 AB…
The Yankees will see what they have in Gardner in ‘09…either he will learn how to hit ML pitching or he won’t…it will up to Gardner…
the yankees aren’t going to give sabathia 7 yrs/20-23 million a year wich is what he will wan’t.
i see the yankees signing a few solid starters like dempster,perez,etc… and trading for 1 or 2 more pitchers.
what i have learned this year is that the pitchers needed do not have to be the best but solid.
they will get pitchers that can get them to the bullpen and the game is over.
the only way signing pitchers work is if they ar under 27 yrs old usually.
relying on sabathia is foolish.the yankees have to build a team.can you imagine if sabathia got hurt after signing? it would be devastating.
trade cano for billingsley,trade hughes for mclouth or votto,sign a second baseman for a year or two,see if sabathia takes 5 years if not don’t sign him,try to sign mussina for one year with an option year,maybe pettitte for one year at less money,try to trade for another young pitcher using kennedy and prospects,take a look at the other free agent pitchers like dempster.hopefully joba can stay healthy and a starter and brackman works out.
there a a few directions the yankees can go in.they can just sign a fa pitcher or two and or trade for 1 or two.one saving grace is that the bullpen looks awesome.
Drive, Brett Gardner’s minor league obs. is .389 . Yes he strikes out alot (287 times), but, he did walk 237 times in the minors.
“I doubt Peavey would put up numbers anywhere close to what he does with the Padres. He is pitching in the NL west, in probably the most pitcher friendly park in the game. Adjust those numbers for the AL, and a less friendly ballpark they wouldn’t be pretty. The Yankees need to just say NO to career NL pitchers.”
You must not watch a lot of baseball. Peavy could dominate anywhere he is a top 5 pitcher.
Big pitch right here…
Nice…that is a playoff game!!!!
RalphieD,
Gardner did improve the last month. But he still only had a .321 obp in September with 11 k’s and only 2 walks.
Okay, so I will have to try to learn who the NL pitchers are – other than CC and Hamels. I hope the Brewers have some decent pitching. Is Sheets shut down?
Phils win
Lidge has guts… pretty much all of his saves have been of that variety
86w183
October 1st, 2008 at 5:40 pm
GB 7—-
At this age Bernie Williams had shown no power either. He hit 8 HR in Columbus at age 23.
I think Jackson with his frame could grow into a much more significant power threat. He hit 9 HR in Trendon at age 21.
_____________________________________________________
Jackson is not a lift and separate type hitter. He’s a line drive hitter. if he gets a mistake he can take it out of the park, If you’re expecting light tower power, forget it. He’ll have some 20 homer type seasons, but unless they try to mess with his swing and get him to hit homers forget it. If they change that swing, somebody needs to be fired.
It did take guts to throw that 2-2 fastball right down Broadway…
Good for him, he had confidence in his stuff and he got the out.
ok i can relax a bit now. Lidge may it a bit hairy but you know what it was a lot better than his last playoff appearance.
trisha -
Sheets is shut down. Gallardo is their version of Hughes. They have Suppan in game 3. No idea who goes in a game 4, maybe Dave Bush?
Phils have Brett Myers, kind of like Burnett a guy with terrific stuff but sometimes is a headcase. Moyer goes in game 3. Blanton goes in game 4.
“You must not watch a lot of baseball. Peavy could dominate anywhere he is a top 5 pitcher.”
No you must not watch a lot of baseball if you don’t think there is a big difference between the NL west, and Petco, and the AL East and YS. If you think Peavey would be the same pitcher here you’re sadly mistaken.
They changed Hughes’ mechanics and turned him into more of an economical pitcher rather than the Strikeout/GB guy he was in Trenton.
They can easily change Jackson’s swing to make him a 20 HR guy, I think they should.
If you’re still watching, they just showed a priest at Wrigley blessing the Cubs dugout.
I told you that the year the Sux won their first world series IN 84 YEARS they had a priest perform an exorcism at fenway field.
Now I want to see how the Cubs do this year!
If you can get Peavy for Hughes, how do you not do it?
That would be a STEAL. They could get much better talent from other teams, so if they want Hughes instead, it should be done without blinking.
If you’re still watching, they just showed a priest at Wrigley blessing the Cubs dugout.
LOL Did they really?
Hey, whatever works!
I’m rooting for the Cubbies!
If minor league stats meant anything, Hensley Meulens would have been a superstar in the majors. There’s a world of difference between the majors and minors. Gardner’s minor league stats are irrelevant. Again, i’d love to have him on the team,but as a bench player not a starter.
“I told you that the year the Sux won their first world series IN 84 YEARS they had a priest perform an exorcism at fenway field.”
Does that mean Tom Gordon was Linda Blair?
Thanks t-rock. Though we all know that anything can happen in the postseason, it sounds like the Phils have the edge in starting pitching unless CC can go every day.
Hey I’m listening to Hamels. Is he a little effeminate? I don’t want to be unPC here…
I really hope “change” means Sabathia in pinstripes. That guy is a warrior and no history of injuries. He’ll hold up just fine even after the Brewers’ overuse.
Ryan Braun is a right handed version of Sean Green. If he stays healthy, he’s going to be a Hell of a ball player for years. Decent outfielder for his first year in the outfield, very good arm and he can run. An outstanding talent.
GreenBeret7,
Thanks for the honest assessment of A Jax. I’m anxious to see him but wary of the Yankee hype machine.
“Does that mean Tom Gordon was Linda Blair?”
S.A., if the Cubbies win this year then I definitely want some holy water sprinkled on the new YS!
“Between” is a preposition. So it takes an object. “He” is a subject. So there can’t be relations “between he and the Steinbrenners.”
At this point, you’re doing this on purpose, right?
Curtis Granderson seems like such a good kid
He’s 25 and he’s already doing studio work in the off-season lol
How many 3 pitch innings have there been in baseball history?
CORRECTION: ***Shawn Green***
guys we’re not getting Peavy for Hughes. i would love if it were true, but its not happening.
he will be a brave or ranger. but if cashman can pull off hughes for peavy, he should get a statue built of him
Grammar police, not here please. I teach 80 odd freshman on the finer points grammar. You’d be surprised how little they know…..
At this stage Cashman can only talk in generalties and can’t be specific due to tampering rules before the free agency period is in effect.
He can hint at what most fans realize as far as the status of Giambi and Abreu are concerned and mainly did it by saying the team will get younger.
Once the Tampa meetings are in force, genuine plans will be formulated and acted on.
A good bet is to figure that the word “untouchable” will not be used with the exception of McAllister, Betances, Laird, Montero, and a few prime others.
Cashman will not feel the need to save face by not considering any deals involving Hughes, Kennedy, or Cabrera to jusify not getting Santana. He’s moved on from last year.
Jackson will be the type of hitter Cano is, power wise. Probably will hit 30-40 doubles and 15 HRs. After that, they are nothing alike. Jackson will be a .275 hitter and probably have 100 Ks a year and 20 steals.
He’ll be a good, not great player.
I just saw Joe Torre’s comments on Lou Pinella. I thought it curious that he mentioned how Lou is close to George Steinbrenner. I wonder what he was getting at.
In any event, I wish Joe Torre well. If only he didnt have Manny Ramirez I’d wish him to win the NL. Here’s hoping torre comes to Yankee Stadium one last time in November. He deserves to be there.
Gary, true.
Joba is really the only untouchable (and obviously guys like Montero, Brackman etc. but those guys have no trade value for star players anyway and Cashman won’t give them away as secondary pieces).
Hughes, Kennedy, Cabrera, etc. can all be had for the right price. If the Peavy rumors are true all those guys will probably go, which is fine with me.
Drive,
There as a blurb on SI a few days ago (via the Chicago Tribune) that says Hank has already asked Pinella to join the Yankees as an adviser when he retires from managing.
Once again – Listen to the interview with Cashman and Francesa at:
http://www.wfan.com/topic/play.....topic=true
Why are guys that have never pitched a ML inning considered ‘untouchable’ and guys that are ML ready are being traded for all variations of other teams’ pitchers?
Seems that 2 years ago…the guys being sent out this off-season were the untouchable ones.
What changed?
Torre is a classy man and deserves the best. However, the media is making me despise him and the Dodgers. The further he goes in the playoffs, the worse off we look as a franchise. The seeds have already been laid by the meidiots.
I will root for a quick Dodgers exit.
Weather Man, in no way am I knocking Santana. The man was heroic in his last start and he’s a great, great pitcher. My point was that no one player, HOFer or not, can guarantee anything in baseball; I don’t believe in guarantees in sports, but it’s much less likely in baseball than, say basketball. If you’re giving up stud prospects plus mucho $$$$$, you’d better be getting a guarantee.
“Jackson will be the type of hitter Cano is, power wise. Probably will hit 30-40 doubles and 15 HRs. After that, they are nothing alike. Jackson will be a .275 hitter and probably have 100 Ks a year and 20 steals.
He’ll be a good, not great player.”
So can we conclude that there really isnt a crown jewel in the Yankee’s system? What about this year’s first 2 draft picks? OOOPS, forget that. lol
If you want to read anything into Cashman’s comments, I don’t think he’s going to pursue Sabathia hard. He’ll show interest, but I still think he believes the best way is to develop pitching. Also from his standpoint, even though he said last year has nothing to do with this year, throwing 150+Mil at CC, is admitting he was wrong on Santana.
vtred,
Thanks. I can think of a lot worse things than having Lou Pinella as a Yankee advisor/consultant.
Drive 4-5
October 1st, 2008 at 6:00 pm
GreenBeret7,
Thanks for the honest assessment of A Jax. I’m anxious to see him but wary of the Yankee hype machine.
________________________________________________________
Drive, trust me. I think the world of this young guy’s talents, but, if people start thinking that he’s going to replace Rodriguez as the next power hitter for the Yanks, they’ll be disappointed and they’ll boo him. I don’t believe the Yanks are pumping him up as a power hitter….just a very good hitter, fielder and base runner. He has very good speed, but, not Gardner speed…more like Jeter and abreau base stealing speed. He’s a very smart and very good base runner. He can steal 30+ bases.
NYY does have the light tower power guys coming in behind him, though. Jesus Montero and Brandon Laird are legitimate 30 homer hitters from the right side. Montero may reach 40 from time to time. If they move Montero from behind the plate to first base, I think it’s a mistake, but, I’m only an amateur talent evaluator (I do it for myself). If he stays as a catcher, though, he’ll have Romine to help him at catcher, but, I also think that Romine could play a good corner outfield. Real good arm and he’s quick. He could be an early version of Elston Howard for possible versatility. Laird is a very good first baseman. He’ll hit for average and big time power and run production. The good thing is, they all hit to all fields with power. romine is maybe a 20 homer kind of guy. He hit 10 in his first year, playing about 2/3rds of the games.
Jonathan,
Because you will never get a good player for a guy who has not thrown an inning at the ML level.
If we could trade McAllister, Brackman, or Betances for Peavy, it would have been done yesterday. Towers will never trade his star ace pitcher for a guy like Betances or Brackman who are YEARS away and have so many question marks surrounding their potential. If those guys were in AA-AAA and dominating, it would be a different story.
They might want our Charleston guys as secondary pieces or 2nd-3rd players in a deal along with Hughes or Cano, but they wouldn’t take them straight up. And why would we want to include guys like that as secondary pieces along with premium talent like Hughes?
Thats why Hughes is pretty much our only trade chip for a stud player. Cano too, but I doubt he goes anywhere.
I loved Torre’s comment, “Joe (Piniella) and I have no problems, well none that I know of”
Eckersly needs to get rid of the 70’s ’stache and ‘do.
I heard something funny on the radio. DP was asking him about something about his pointing at batters. Eckersly’s like, “Wha’? I was pointing at the pitch telling the ump it’s a strike.” Funny stuff.
Wait – Cashman said that Phil is actively being shopped? Or, at least, that he could be had? Wow – now I am completely bummed out. I’m not talking about a Peavy deal – I’m talking bout the Yankees looking for takers. Wow – now, how am I supposed to have any faith in Cashman if one day Phil is untouchable and, a few (and it was only a few) bad starts later, he is on the table. This is not like SJ44 was suggesting before, that you only deal Phil for a stud; you kind of wait and put out feelers with SD regarding that. For Cash to say that Phil can be had (not necssarily for a Peavy type) is shocking and very, very disappointing. Cash has no patience with young pitchers except for Joba it seems.
“Romine could play a good corner outfield. Real good arm and he’s quick. He could be an early version of Elston Howard for possible versatility.”
Now, THERE’s something to be excited about. If Romine can be anyway compared to Ellie, we might have something.
Braintrust,
That’s what I got from his comments to. The “just because there is somebody you want doesn’t mean they want you” shows the skepticism from Cashman that CC will sign here.
If its determined that Sabathia indeed wants nothing to do with NY, then I doubt we will bid much at all. Maybe just a token bid. They will determine that beforehand.
I get the sense that Cash wants a Derek Lowe type in the FA market. He also made a point that Joba and Wang were the only guarentees in the rotation.
Cashman said that the priority was pitching and he will pursue pitchers through trade and free agency. He can’t be specific at this point. He also said that the only starter with a guaranteed spot in the rotation next season is Wang and probably Joba.
I didn’t take away from Cashman interview that they wouldn’t go after Sabathia. Just that it wasn’t worth trading for Santana because of the price of 4 top prospects and the money. Sabathia is just money. The Yankees will go after him hard, although it would be great if they could get him for a shorter time, like 5 years $130M.
oops. *Lou
Untouchable implies not tradeable because the organization is building around these players…not that they have no trade value.
Whatever…trading Hughes at this point is a mistake…it would’ve been a mistake last year…it’ll will be a mistake this year…it is short sighted and reactionary
Anyway I’ve railed against this idea all day long…nobody’s changing my mind as I’m not changing anyone elses mind, so to prevent further blisters I have no more comments on the issue…
Did that guy on the Cubs game say understudy instead of understatement? lol – that was strange.
Betsy,
Cashman got burned badly by Melky, Igawa and Kennedy. It sounds like he’s learned to be more careful putting too much faith in anybody. I think that it’s a healthy thing.
I’d rather he be open minded about trade proposals than overprotective of yankee prospects. I doubt he’s give up Phil for anyone but a legitimate major league player that is going to fill ( or Phil, as it were) a hole.
Cashman may be of the mind that it’s better to rid the team of a player a year too soon than a year too late in the case of Abreu.
Abreu will want [at least] a 2 year deal which clearly puts him on the downside of his career and virtually useless with a glove on.
Betsy,
Cashman never said that directly, you have to read between the lines. Why would he come out and say that openly? You can listen to his interview on WFAN.com. The impression most people got was he would be willing to shop the kids for pitching if it came to that. That doesn’t mean he definitely will, all depends how the off-season shapes up. It sounds like he will tinker a lot in the trade market too to get younger in the lineup.
The only declaration he made was that Joba and Wang were the only sure things in the rotation.
“…since last winter when some moves were made he did not approve of.”
PayRod? Definitely Torre as well, that’s a given.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Damon in the outfield and Matsui at DH weakens the team. Hasn’t this been proven? Hang on to Damon, package Matsui to a west coast team and GET YOUNGER — PLEASE!
People can run stats and criticize Cashman all they want but I respect him for re-signing and sticking around to fix things. I really can’t think of anyone else available that can deal with that nuthouse of a FO.
Would YOU want to report to Hal, Hank and Levine for another 3 years when its clear they don’t have the vision or commitment to the organization their father did/does ? That’s a loud “NO” from me…
Cashman made it sound as if all bets are off as far as the prospects go and that he plans to win next year. The only guys he singled out and prasied really were Coke and Joba. Even went as far to say Joba WILL be in the rotation along with Wang and thats it.
http://www.wfan.com/pages/223566.php
here is cashmans audio
for Peavey, it will take a key “secondary” player, or 2.
No way, SD will take a Hughes/Peavey, 1 for 1 trade. At this point, Kennedy and Melky would only be throw-ins. Neither player have much value. And the the only ‘major league ready’ players available on the NYY roster, would be a bullpen arm.
in addition to Hughes, would expect SD to ask for a Jackson, Malancon, McCallister, Montero, Betances, or Romine, etc.
maybe: Hughes, Melky, Veras, McCallister
It appeared that Brian meant that the combination of prospects and money were what nixed the Santana trade, not Hughes. And that if a similar deal came along where it wouldn’t require a huge extension (a la Peavy), then Cashman would not hesitate to trade Hughes or anybody.
Brian came across that he will be very proactive this off-season and will look to make deals and not be as protective as he was last year./
Green Beret 7,
I agree with you on your Austin Jackson to an extent but I feel like thats the most likely scenario, but he definitely has 20-25 HR type power. His line drives will carry further as grows a bit more. To me he is a bit more like Jeter than a Cano, but Jeter was the better pure hitter while Jackson has more pop.If Jeter had B- power then Jackson has a B, and in his prime Jeter was a 18 HR a guy sort of year. Jackson can get up there if he plays to his natural progression. He isn’t Montero but like Jeter he is a nice player who can have special moments with his CF defense.
Montero has 80 power thats a perennial 40 HR guy.
They are trying to engineer another dynasty around Hughes and Joba. Seriously they are 22 years old. Give them a chance. Could you imagine these two kids competing with each other for a Cy Young award a few years in a row? How about in the post season for the next 8 years if they stay healthy together. If you want to see Hughes get traded youre going to be very disappointed this offseason.
Now, drive, don’t get excited. That was only my opinion on Romine, but, like Ellie Howard was, Romine’s an exceptionally good athlete. He’s one that could pull it off. However, when Romine was drafted, it was more for his catching skills, but, Montero was the better catcher this year and caught most of the games.
If the move Montero to first base, they’d need to move Laird to the outfield, because, honestly, right now, he’s not a real good third baseman. They have Brad Suttle playing third and he’s still rough, but, promising.
vinny,
if SD wants hughes, melky, veras, or mcallister let them have them.
as long as the 2nd player isin’t jackson, romine, cano, montero, they can have anybody they want. any of the relievers– sanchez, robertson, veras, etc. or anybody else. if they want kennedy or kontos or aceves they can have them.
http://www.wfan.com/pages/744503.php
more cashman audio.
i think this is with mike on wfan
***********CC UPDATE***********
I have almost concluded my onsite research here in Vallejo. The consensus is that CC is pretty good. I’ll pass on more as I get it.
*********DEVELOPING STORY*********
Hughes competing with Joba for the CY Young?
LOL, thats like Gardner competing with Cano for a batting title.
No offense to Hughes, he will be a solid pitcher in his own right.
Peavy and Joba competing for the CY young sounds much better and is a far more realistic.
It’s not like we’re proposing we trade Hughes for Aaron Cook. We’re talking about trading him for a 26 yr old CY Young winner with nasty stuff.
Anyone else having a hard time watching this game?
On so many levels. From the Bon Jovi promotional with all the players (hate the RSox) to Joe Torre being there without the Yankees. I’m fighting back tears. Don’t really understand why. I don’t really really care who wins.
I didn’t feel this way during the Phillies/Brewers game. But this stinks. I’m probably gonna switch to Jeopardy at 7, because i can’t handle it.
wolf: word. And if they’ll take Kennedy, throw-in free pizza coupons.
they don’t have pizza, in cali.
Serious question. How is Hughes less valuable than Austin Romine?
Plus it’s got to be killing Red Sox fans (not that I should care) hearing about what a “team player” Manny is for the Dodgers. It’s killing me, and i don’t like Manny or the Red Sox.
Yay! Manny DP!
Dempster with a nice first inning
Does anyone know where we can get some Cashman audio? Maybe someone could post the link?
It sounds like Cash is in favor of Joba being in the rotation to start the year, and I agree. There are enough pitchers on the Scranton express that can stay in the pen. Phil coke will be important next year. We should also get a look at Melancon, and Sanchez in spring training. With Wang & Joba, we can get a Derek Lowe, and bring back either Pettitte or Musina. I don’t see both of them returning, and I feel that Moose will retire. Andy still has something to prove, Moose doesn’t. The 5th spot can be a competition in the spring between Hughes, Kennedy, and Aceves. My money is on Hughes. I think he’ll come back strong next year.
GB7,
“Now, drive, don’t get excited. ”
Too late. I’m gonna hold you to it. lol
Ellie was one of my favorite players growing up. Him & Pepitone.
mel,
I think he meant if you give up Hughes to begin with, you don’t want to also give up a good secondary piece like Romine as the 2nd or 3rd player in the deal.
If you could get Peavy for Romine, you do it without thinking. But they will want an established player if they trade their ace pitcher, not an A-ball catcher.
doreen: hoping the presentation/camerawork, is as good as last night’s game. Really enjoyed it.
however, not able to tolerate the annoying viagra commercials.
Jeff NJ :
i posted two of them above
That was making me feel barfy too, Doreen. First time ever I felt a microscopic bit of sympathy for Red Sox fans having to hear that stuff about Manny.
“Now, drive, don’t get excited. That was only my opinion on Romine, but, like Ellie Howard was, Romine’s an exceptionally good athlete. He’s one that could pull it off. However, when Romine was drafted, it was more for his catching skills, but, Montero was the better catcher this year and caught most of the games.
If the move Montero to first base, they’d need to move Laird to the outfield, because, honestly, right now, he’s not a real good third baseman. They have Brad Suttle playing third and he’s still rough, but, promising.”
Most of the scouts will say otherwise about Romine and Montero in terms of defense. Romine also got injured which probably contributed to Montero getting the starts there. If one of them should move it should be Montero to LF, granted they’d need to get him to drop some weight to increase his quickness but he has a cannon.
Mel,
The answer is Hughes is way more valuable than Romine.
http://www.wfan.com/pages/744503.php
Doreen,
Nope. No feelings at all.
But I did have a twinge of sadness that we’re not there. But it passed when I thought of the silver lining.
The whole what doesn’t kill you will make you stronger thing. (Kanye West?)
And the pressure of keeping up the streak is gone.
Basically aside from praise for Coke and Joba, there was not much else he said.
Doreen,
I despise Manny Ramirez. But you have to admit, it would be kinda cool for Manny Ramirez to hit a home run to win the World Series for the Dodgers against Boston while the Red Sox pay every penney of his salary to beat them.
http://www.wfan.com/pages/223566.php
TBS was awful coverage last year. I hope they improve this year.
A number of people think this year was lost due to poor starting pitching, and hold Cashman responsible.
Below are 17 games from this season.
17 Games, all LOSES, where our SP ERA was under 4.
(A ‘qualty start’ is 6 IP, 3 ER = 4.50 ERA)
May 6 – Andy, 6.1 IP, 2 ER, ERA 2.85: We lost 5-3
May 7 – Wang, 7 IP, 3 ER, ERA 3.85: We lost 3-0
May 13 – Wang, 7 IP, 1 ER, ERA 1.29 Ww lost 2-1
May 26 – Rasner, 6 IP, 1 ER, ERA 1.50, We lost 6-1
Jun 6- Rasner, 8 IP, 2 ER, ERA 2.25, We lost 2-1
Jun 9- Moose, 8 IP, 2 ER, ERA 2.25, We lost 3-2
Jun 21 – Giese, 6.2 IP, 0 ER, ERA 0.00: We lost 6-0
Jun 29 – Rasner, 5 IP, 2 ER, ERA 3.60, We lost 3-1
Jun 30 – Moose, 6 IP, 2 ER, ERA 3.00, We lost 2-1
Jul 10 – Moose, 6 IP, 2 ER, ERA 3.00, We lost 4-2
Aug. 1 – Ponson, 7 IP, O ER, ERA 0.00: We lost 1-0
Aug 10 – Andy, 7 IP, 3 ER, ERA 3.85: We lost 4-3
Aug 13 – Rasner, 5 IP, 2 ER, ERA 3.60, We lost 4-2
Aug 15 – Andy, 7 IP, 3 ER, ERA 3.85: We lost 4-3
Aug 19 – Rasner, 6.2 IP, 1 ER, ERA 1.45, We lost 2-1
Sep 5 – Andy, 7 IP, 3 ER, ERA 3.85: We lost 3-1
Sep 28 – Ponson, 6 IP, 1 ER, ERA 1.50, We lost 4-3
17 games – 17 Loses
SP ERA 2 or better = 6 games
SP ERA 3 or better = 5 games
SP ERA 4 or better = 6 games
So basically, we had ELEVEN Acelike performances, and 6 decent performances that we lost.
So, If we had Santana, and he pitched those ELEVEN games with an ERA of 3 oir better in ALL 11, and still LOST all 11, would you feel better?
Obviously, it would not have happened that way.
Obviously, with Santana, we would have won more games.
Obviously, if Wang and Joba weren’t injured, we would have won more games.
In Eleven of these games, our staff held the opponents to 3 runs or less.
We finished SIX games out of the WC. Six games away from winning 95 games…
EVEN WITH ALL THE INJURIES, with CANO and MELKY playing like crap, with AROD and GIAMBI having very poor RISP years.
We lost by SIX games, and our crappy crappy crappy SPs gave us SEVENTEEN quality starts that were lost.
If we win HALF of those 17, we WIN the DIVISION.
EVERY team wants an Ace, wins more games with an Ace.
Our Ace (and Joba) got injured. Another Ace would have been great.
But we did NOT need that Ace to Win.
We needed our offense to be 85% of last year, and our big guys to have an AVERAGE RISP.
The truth is we blew this year because of a multitude of reasons.
But even with an injured Wang and Joba, even with Hughes and IPK giving us NOTHING,
Our crappy crappy crappy SP posted a lower ERA then last year (when we were in the PS)
bru, I was being sarcastic. People keep posting the same link. Most people can probably figure out how to get to the WFAN site and download it if they made it here. It’s not like any of us is John McCain.
If Torre wasn’t the manager, I would absolutley agree.
But the Yankees franchise will be dragged through the mud if Torre is back in the WS and god forbid wins one.
Anyone else having a hard time watching this game?
Doreen -
I feel like I’m watching the Yankees and Red Sox rivialry.
Former Yankees:
Ted Lilly
Lou Pinella
Joe Torre
Alfonso Soriano
Former Red Sox:
Derek Lowe
Nomar Garciaparra
Manny Ramirez
Mel, I don’t know. That’s two completely different things. You’re right…impossible to compare a young catcher to a young pitcher. I’d prefer not moving either one. I realize that the Yanks can’t keep everyone, but, you can’t trade them for a setback. If that was the case, Jeter would have never gotten to NYY with a .202 BA one year and 55 errors in another.
mel -
Yes, I’ll keep my mind on the silver lining(s). Not a small thing to not have to keep up the streak.
Hey, Soriano struck out! Familiar territory there.
I think I have a music/tears thing. The Bon Jovi song I guess – very Pavlovian, I know.
Sorry, I took this ” jackson, romine, cano, montero” to be list of semi-untouchables.
“I despise Manny Ramirez. But you have to admit, it would be kinda cool for Manny Ramirez to hit a home run to win the World Series for the Dodgers against Boston while the Red Sox pay every penney of his salary to beat them.”
It would definitely be very ironic and likely infuriating for Red Sox fans.
sorry i didn’t know
“TBS was awful coverage last year. I hope they improve this year”
it was excellent, last night. The presentation, felt like, were at the game.
i was getting excited thinking i was on to something.
I thought I would be upset watching these games and constantly thinking, the Yankees could have been playing now. Ugh!
But I’m not for some reason.
Oh well. Go Cubs!
We’ll be back next season.
This Dodgers-Cubs series will be fun.
Dodgers stadium has no atmosphere though. When the Mets played there in the 06 NLDS, it was brutal.
Drive 4-5
If we could fast forward to that point and skip all the annoying, games, promos and news articles in between, I’d LOVE to see that happen! (Manny hitting game-winning HR vs RS)
vinny-b-
The viagara commercials are a little creepy.
“But the Yankees franchise will be dragged through the mud if Torre is back in the WS and god forbid wins one.”
That doesnt bother me one bit. The Yankees underachieved and deserve what they get. Injuries or not, there’s no excuse for that team to hit so poorly with RISP and not be at least 8 games better than they were. 8 games gives them the Wild Card.
I’m not blown away so far tonight, but I’m still baffled over the understudy/understatement thing I heard, lol.
Old Yanks Fan -
Wow!!
Will Lackey turn into a pumpkin when he faces the Sox tonight like he always does when he faces Boston?
Ari, the injury to Romine had nothing to do with Montero catching more. Montero was just the better catcher. I saw them play in about half of their games. Romine had 18 passed balls, more errors and had a worse percentage of base runners thrown out in half as many games. They’ll both get better, but, Montero is right now, the better defensive catcher. as far as calling the game, there’s no way of knowing, because Tyson calls the pitches.
Angel -
I heard it, too. Thought I was hearing things, so I managed to convince myself that he must have just “swallowed” the end of the world. But now that I know you heard it too, I’m SURE that’s what he said!
This is actually my first time watching a Dodgers game this season.
What is Tom Verducci doing working TV? Is he trying to damage his credibility?
Am I wrong for wanting the Dodgers to lose?
“Ari, the injury to Romine had nothing to do with Montero catching more. Montero was just the better catcher. I saw them play in about half of their games. Romine had 18 passed balls, more errors and had a worse percentage of base runners thrown out in half as many games. They’ll both get better, but, Montero is right now, the better defensive catcher. as far as calling the game, there’s no way of knowing, because Tyson calls the pitches.”
Honestly I was going by the general consensus, but since you’ve seen Montero what do you think about him behind the plate? Can he stick behind the plate, how’s the pop time,arm,etc.?
“Dodgers stadium has no atmosphere though. When the Mets played there in the 06 NLDS, it was brutal.”
I’ll have to disagree with you, Clint. I was there for that game and was pleasantly surprised how amped up the crowd was – the 1 1/2 hour wait to exit the parking lot WAS brutal, however.
Mel, those listed, right now are pretty much untouchable as far as positional players go, although Sublett, Angelini and perhaps one other are close to that “untouchable” grade. There are probably 6-7 pitchers that may fit that group.
“I despise Manny Ramirez. But you have to admit, it would be kinda cool for Manny Ramirez to hit a home run to win the World Series for the Dodgers against Boston while the Red Sox pay every penney of his salary to beat them.â€
Drive, I love when you make me smile!
I just switched over to the game so haven’t seen Torre yet. I don’t know what my visceral reaction will be when I see him. I guess it could either make me sad because it will make me think of the Yanks, or it will have no effect whatsoever. I’ll see when it happens.
Right now I am kind of in S.A.land. I think it’s because we really did have a while to get used to the idea of not being in the postseason. If I were a Mets fan I might still be in bed.
“Am I wrong for wanting the Dodgers to lose?”
Hell no! I want them to lose and I don’t question it a bit.
well it didnt took the Cubs long to score.
AWESOME!
And by the way I don’t want any part of Derek Lowe.
“I despise Manny Ramirez. But you have to admit, it would be kinda cool for Manny Ramirez to hit a home run to win the World Series for the Dodgers against Boston while the Red Sox pay every penney of his salary to beat them.â€
+ 100
I’m rooting for a Sox-Dodgers WS and seeing Torre and Manny teaming up and going into Fenway to play the Sox.
Now granted the Sox will win their 3rd WS in 5 years but it would be a great story.
“I think I have a music/tears thing. The Bon Jovi song I guess – very Pavlovian, I know.”
Doreen I know that one well.
What song did Bon Jovi sing? Did Bon Jovi sing? Or was it just a Bon Jovi song that was played?
The two kids that I’m really looking forward to see in Charleston is Pat Venditte, but, especially, Addison Muruszak, the shortstop at Staten Island. He may end up forcing Angelini to center field or maybe 2nd base.
Ok, I want no part of Lowe.
Bring on Dempster
Trisha -
It was “I Love This Town.”
I’m not a huge Bon Jovi fan. His songs have this “hook” though…
“I’m rooting for a Sox-Dodgers WS and seeing Torre and Manny teaming up and going into Fenway to play the Sox.
Now granted the Sox will win their 3rd WS in 5 years but it would be a great story.”
Thats an awful story. Maybe if the Redsox lose its great. But not the other way around. No. Terrible.
For those who doesn’t know. Since 1998 Cashman made over 9 trades with Kevin Tower, the most with any other GM. They just simply like working with each other. As for Jake Peavy, I think Towers would take some B prospects to land him. I wonder if Cashman immediately contacted Towers this morning.
Does anyone remember back in the late 90’s when we had the so-called Four Aces, consisting of Wells, Pettite, Cone and El Duque?
How’s this for an idea.. Sign CC Sabathia, then trade Cano and Hughes for Jake Peavy. Convince Pettite or Mussina or come back. My preference is Mussina )I am more than sick of Pettite.) If not have Aceves, Kennedy or Coke as your 5th starter and then sign Hudson to replace Cano. Then, and hey Cashman said it a Firstbasemen to play first. Teixera for Firstbase.
A rotation of:
CC Sabathia
Chien Ming Wang
Jake Peavy
Joba Chamberlain
Mussina, Pettite, Coke, Aceves or Kennedy (In that order)
A Lineup of:
LF Damon
SS Jeter
1B Teixera
3B Arod
RF Nady
C Posada
DH Matsui
2B Hudson
CF Gardiner or Melky
Not bad…
I’m joking harwood. I know the Red Sox probably won’t make it out of the first round.
I want to see Torre and Manny get rings.
Doreen I know what you mean about the Bon Jovi song.
I still have to see Torre in the dugout to be able to do a gut check on this series.
I’m really sick of the trading Cano thing. Who in the right mind would replace a 26 year old 2B with a 32 year old one? It’s like replacing Ian Kinsler with Jeff Kent to play 2b.
GB 7—
Bernie never hit more than 30 HR, reaching that milestone once. He topped 25 4X. I see no reason to doubt that Austin Jackson could approach Bernie’s average season which was 20 HR for the 14 full seasons of his career.
Time will tell
Peavy, the face of his franchise and his ace under control for the next few years for cheap, for some B prospects? Well if Hughes is considered a B prospect then yes, maybe Towers would do it.
Bernie had much more power than Jackson will.
Think of AJax like Melky with more gap power and 10 more SBs. More Strikeouts too, same average though.
Ari, both have very good arms and get rid of the ball quick. None of the pitchers in Charleston can hold a runner on base, though. It was the difference in errors and especially the passed balls that concerned me. Neither were great, but, Romine was really bad 18 in 54 games caught.
As far as Montero goes, the talk about him outgrowing the position is the chief concern, but, he’s not fat or pudgy. He’s just a big strong kid. Not really much taller than Carlton Fisk was and weighs about the same. He has quick feet and moves well behind the plate. Except in practice, he’s never played first base, but, other than as a fill-in, not sure that you’ll ever see him in the outfield.
Yes, Dempster got out of that, but I’m not impressed so far.
I know it’s not the best way to do business but I have gotten to the point where I automatically don’t trust NL pitchers coming over to the AL.
Abreu is a better hitter than Nady. Nady is a better fielder
Until these kids actually play in the biggies it’s absolute speculation with few exceptions. However, it is interesting to speculate about the prospects, how Ajax will pan out, will Brackman be a wasted draft pick or a winner. It’s what makes it all very interesting though at times a bit frustrating. I recall many years ago, I used to fantasize about Bob Hertel, Kal Segrist and Bill Renna making it bigtime and joining Mickey, the Original Moose, Yogi and the rest of the mid-50’s gang in perpetuating the dynasty of 49-53. Never happened, but it was fun anyway. Enjoy it, but in the here and now don’t be surprised if Manny is wearing pinstripes in 09 (tho still a longshot).
Drive 4 for 5, I can understand that line of thinking – and in general, you don’t want to overrate your prospects because then you won’t ever make any moves that could very likely improve the team. However, won’t you grant that it was Brian’s fault for rushing Phil in 2007 (after he said that we wouldn’t see him until at least September)? I’m not blaming him for the injury, but Phil lost a ton of development time that he should have had in AAA. He had a few bad starts this year and then got hurt. Before 2007, Phil was practically untouchable; the Yankees loved this kid. What I want to know is this: when did he become less untouchable that they would even seriously consider (never mind a Peavy-like deal) moving him? Are they so satisfied with Joba that they have decided that Phil, who basically epitomized the rebirth of the farm system, is just spare parts? If Brian relied on the kids too much last year, that is HIS fault, not Phil’s (or Ian)’s. It’s been quoted in the last couple of months (I will try to find the links) that the Yankees think of Phil as a top of the rotation starter. Ok, you don’t trade those pitchers. The Yankees drafted Phil and developed him – if they get rid of him, even for some decent/solid major leaguers, what does that say about them? It tells me that they (since they are so high on him) don’t have the patience to wait out a just-turned 22 year old.
“I’m really sick of the trading Cano thing. Who in the right mind would replace a 26 year old 2B with a 32 year old one? It’s like replacing Ian Kinsler with Jeff Kent to play 2b.”
———————————————————
Thank you for a moment of sanity. They are greatly needed here.
Doreen… Thanks for reading. I know I posted too many words and numbers for a lot of people here to digest.
James 3D, I guess you’re saying that only pitchers that throw 99 MPH can be aces? What is it with those who drool over Joba that they can’t recognize Phil for being a very talented kid in his own right? Why was he the #1 pitching prospect in baseball? I know it wasn’t because he threw as hard as Joba, so obviously the scouts saw quite a few things they liked. Deciding at this very early stage (sheesh, and he pitched very well at the end of last year and in the post-season) that Phil will be “solid” is extremely premature. Why is it that people have to rush to judgment?
Pat Kelly: not bad.
if have CC and Peavey, then addition of Tex is over-the-top.
we already took the traveling all-stars, path. A Blalock at 1st base, with the above pitching would be fine. Better to avoid long committments.
“Think of AJax like Melky with more gap power and 10 more SBs. More Strikeouts too, same average though”
well if thats the case….sigh…
OYF -
I thought it was interesting to see it in B&W just how often the offense came up short and how many times the pitchers were cheated. Rasner & Ponson did about what was expected of a 4 & 5 (maybe a little less) for the most part. Just a bad, bad, offensive season.
Never trust anything Brian says at face value.
Remember, when Tabata was going through his struggles, Cashman came out and fully supported him. Saying that they still consider him the crown jewel of their system and a guy they consider a big part of their future. They also dismissed his problems and accentuated how he was the youngest player in the league and so many players his age go through them and they are not holding it against him at all.
2 weeks later, traded for Nady. Cashman is always going to hype his guys up, doesn’t mean they are untouchable, infact maybe he is hyping them up for a reason.
“The two kids that I’m really looking forward to see in Charleston is Pat Venditte”
what kind of prospect is venditte. I saw this one video about him and from what i remember he didnt have much of a fastball. i know hes gotta the whole 2 arm thingy but that probaly wont prove to be too useful as he faces better hitters.
Listening to that interview, it sounds like Hal may have told Cashman that he has to win this year and can’t just sit back and wait for kids to live up the hype. The recent economic problems make it that much more important for the Yankees to put a good product on the field to support their costs. Cashman really sounded like he was going to approach this off-season aggressively and with a sense of urgency.
He hinted that the SP would come via the trade and not Sabathia (saying that just because you want someone doesn’t mean they want you). I think the Hughes-Peavy rumor has legs.
ralphie,
an organizational arm… he is a gimmicky pitcher thats why he gets so much attention. stuff wise, he is average at best.
With a “Bowa type guy” on his tail everyday and without the negative influence of those who play for stats and do not hustle, Cano should hit in the .320 – .350 range, with 20 – 30 homers and 100 – 120 rbis, and play an excellent second base. To trade him would be ludicrous when resolution of the impediments to the realization of his potential is rather simple. I assume Cashman knows what to do.
where is this hughes-peavy rumor from anyways..i only read on MLBTR that peavy MAY be available this offseason..where did hughes come into the picture and whether or not this is attractive to the pad’s
carl pavano, todd van popell, edwin jackson, brein taylor, paul wilson, rick ankiel, steve avery, brad penny, homer baily etc. were all #1 pitching prospects.
being ranked #1 doesn’t mean you are destined for stardom
Ralph,
Olney mentioned on Mike and Mike today and said that if we don’t get Sabathia (and he doesn’t think we will) we will turn our attention to Peavy and propose the same package we did for Santana (Hughes, Kennedy, Melky). Didn’t say if that would be enough or that the Pads wold be interested, but did say that would be where we’d go for pitching. Also said we would look at a Derek Lowe as well for a short term deal.
Good job Brian!
Build a nice team. Those of us who are older than 20 know it takes a time.
Old teams will not be winning in the post augment era.
I thought it was interesting that Cashman said that he wouldn’t trade for Santana because he’s the type of player that is a final puzzle piece and that he didn’t think it would lead to winning in October. If thats the case, I wonder what he thinks it will take for the Yankees to be a winning October team. I also think his comments regarding first base could mean that the Yankees will go after Teixeira, which I hope is the case.
If the Yankees can’t get Sabathia, Cash needs to convince Moose to come back. I think he’s still on the fence and I’d rather have him and Pettitte than risk big contracts with Lowe, Burnett, Sheets, or Perez.
” Those of us who are older than 20 know it takes a time”
im 19 and I know
Dempster lost it.
Jason Giambi with the Gram Slam.
Woo!
Yanks lead 4-2!
Looks like clock has struck midnight on the Cubbies.
Torre taking another team deep into October.
maybe we shouldn’t have gotten rid of torre…
The one trade for Cano that I would think seriously about were I Cashman (that is realistically doable) would be an even up deal for Matt Holliday, who has one year left on his K for 13.5 mill. The Rockies do not believe Holliday can be re-signed, and if Boros and Cashman were to work out a multi-year deal, O’Dowd would jump on it. If Orlando Hudson could then be signed it might make sense. However, I would not do the deal as I would label Cano untouchable. By the way, don’t believe the nonsense that Holliday only hits at Coors; he is a complete player.
Loney just hit the slam, but do you know what really set it up? Manny’s professional at bat in drawing a BB; he stayed cool throughout (our guys should and could learn from him as to how to do it in the clutch…do you think Arod would have wangled that walk or taken the big K?) If Michael Kay is correct in stating that “he is afraid the Yankees will sniff ‘around’” , don’t you think Cashman will have some conversations with Torre as to Manny and take it from there?
Torre, if asked, will tell it like it is.
Torre Magic lives on!
Dempster is now in the dumpster.
A-Rod with the error.
Double play for Wang?
3 walks in a row and Lou left him in? Why wasnt Lou coaching the teams the yanks played this season. Lou! what were you thinking?!
Dempster = Epic fail
Soriano is off to his usual hot post-season play.
“Torre Magic lives on!”
Yeah lots of magic going one and out in the AL right??? So what did he find some fairy dust on the west coast? Maybe tinkerbelle visited his huge schnozola and stuck some fairy dust up so when he picks his nose now magic comes out?
If Torre had magic he wouldn’t have been forced out of his job.
ER, you called it.
Way to go Wang!
lol.
having a killer lineup, helps as well. Lot of talent, on that team.
Wait I’ve got a good idea. How about Joe goes up 2 games and loses the next 3? He’s good at that!
Zombrano and his creaky elbow going tomorrow against Billingsly who is the ace of the staff.
Torre might sweep the Cubs. They needed this game, they are done now.
Who is the prospect in the minors who has the most upside on offense. Is it Montero?
update
Sure Cashman can let Abreu walk, the Yankees don’t need a career .300 hitter, who just had a season with 20 HR’s, 100 rbi’s, 100 runs, 39 doubles, 73 walks, 21 stolen bases, an OBP of .372 and the consistant ability to hit with runners in scoring position.
34 is too old to be a Yankee, get rid of Abreu…the Yankees can also get used to not making the playoffs because if they let that kind of talent go they are going to be ending the season in September for some years to come.
I want Torre to fail but how fun would it be to watch this talented Cubs team go out in the 1st round after everyone predicted them to go to the WS and break their curse?
from what I read so far, there are 2 GMs had regretted trading their your pitchers:
Tom Hick, Rangers GM regretted trading John Danks for Brandon McCarthy (been injuried for most of this and last season).
Dave Dombrowski, Tigers GM regretted trading Jair Jurrjens for Edgar Renteria.
young*
Trading Cano for Matt Holliday would be a terrible move. Without mentioning Cano’s ability on offense and defense, just look at who is on the Yankees. Matsui, Nady, and Damon are all corner outfielders. So is Holliday. The Yankees have no middle infielders in the farm system while their best position player is an outfielder. Holliday is a .280 hitter with 30 HRs away from Coors Field over the last 3 years (he’s hit .370 at home with twice as many HRs). Holliday is 3 years older than Cano. Holliday is also a free agent after next season along with Carl Crawford and Jason Bay.
Orlando Hudson is 30 years old, and is not as talented as Cano.
I hope Cashman doesn’t consider a trade like this. If Cano is traded, it only makes sense to trade him for a top starting pitcher because there are no top hitting CFers available and its too easy to find good hitting corner outfielders or first baseman.
new post up guys (and gals)
Showalter ‘09 ,
Cubs have to win. I have no faith in the Phillies. And as much as I love Joe, he can NOT go to the WS with the freaking Dodgers. No.
So. Bac from class. Did I miss anything?
trisha – BRING BOBBY BACK! October 1st, 2008 at 8:42 pm
Lowe is so gross. The Cubs should be able to get to him. I remember watching him blowe so many games when he was with the Sux. But then I have to remember – this is the NL.
That’s just Buster’s opinion – he knows as much about the situation as we do, meaning nothing. He has no clue as to what the Yankees would offer for Peavy (Phil’s name comes up all the time by sportswriters and frankly, they are just pulling names out of hat).
Also, the Yankees never offered Hughes and Kennedy, plus Melky, for Santana., Buster is an idiot – he should do his homework. Cash did not want to include Hughes in the Santana deal, he only did it very reluctantly. The deal was off the table in a few days once the Twins didn’t bite – they asked for Phil, got him, then demanded more from the Yankees. Additionally, the Yankees asked the Twins what the Twins were looking for in a Santana deal – the Yankees never offered up specific players.
MANNY!!!
Mark Teixeira. Get this team a longterm answer at 1B.
James Loney in the postgame said what all the young Dodgers have been saying for the past two months about Manny…his work ethic in preparing for a game…nobody works harder, and it’s rubbed off…Ethier, Loney, Kemp, Martin. Cano would bat .350, or close to it, if Manny wore the pinstripes next year. Arod would be re-ignited (Manny for G behind him?) Don’t bet against it.